Pieces of the puzzle
by Izzy713
Summary: Izzy Santiago didn't know what to expect when she first walked into the BAU on her first day as the teams new profiler, she most definitely did not expect to catch the eye of Doctor Spencer Reid. New to the team she must navigate the waters of catching and putting away unsubs, all while the relationship between her and Reid blossoms into something that neither of them ever expected
1. The Botch Doctor

**Authors note- Hey guys! I just wanted to give a little information about what they fanfic is going to look like before it begins, and if you aren't interested in any of this than you can just scroll down and begin reading, for any of those people I really hope you enjoy this first chapter. So I began watching Criminal Minds 3 weeks ago, in that time I have watched all 11 seasons and am anxiously awaiting for season 12 just like all you guys, I can't even put into words how much I love his show and how much I feel like it's a big part of my life, like this has only happened like one other time with a show and it was when I started watching my all time favorite show that I literally have my room themed lol, so obviously I wanted to write a fanfiction based on it because not only does the profiling aspect of the show intrigue me (hence writing about different cases for my favorite crime fighting family to solve would be a dream come true) but also since the first time he made his very first appearance in the show I have been hopelessly and hopefully incurably in love with both Doctor Spencer Reid and Matthew Gray Gubler. I adore everything about Reid and while I love all the other characters with all my heart I have always known I wanted my fanfiction to focus on him, so this is obviously going to be heavily focused on Reid and the team as they solve cases, but the kicker is that as a writer I have always been able to imagine myself being in the show and obviously having the dream of mine to end up with Reid, and I am not crazy so I know that isn't really going to happen so I came up with an O.C that I could live through while I am writing this fanfic, so the character of Izzy started as the idea for myself, and while I am writing her I am going to imagine it is me every single time but since you don't know what I look like it won't matter to you, the only similarities that we share are our first name, our nickname, our ethnicity and the fact that we are in love with Reid. She is every much as an O.C as any other fanfic you can find on this website, I really thought that was important to address so none of you were getting the wrong message considering that you can see very clearly that my name is Izzy from my username.**

 **Now that that's out of the way I just want to give you some more quick information before getting to the actual story, the perspectives with change from Reid to Izzy, that isn't limited to specific chapters only being in just one of their perspectives, it can and probably will change mid chapter, also each chapter will be pretty long and will be set up how an episode would go, it will follow the whole team through a case but will heavily focus on Izzy and Reid and how their relationship develops. Also each chapter will have a title as if it was an episode. The fanfic is up to date as in if you haven't seen every single episode you could stumble across some spoilers so I am warning you now, and while I know Morgan and Prentiss left I am going to have the full team consisting of Hotch, Garcia, Reid, Morgan, Rossi, JJ, and Prentiss so you can think of it as my take on season 12 if they didn't have Morgan leave, Prentiss came back for sure, and they hadn't fired Thomas and are taking our Hotch away from us. So I really hope that was helpful in some way and you understand that Izzy's life and backstory are just things I created for her and while she started off based on me we are only a little alike, I just really couldn't imagine writing a fanfic where Reid doesn't end up with an Izzy, I mean it's kinda the best name. Anyway thank you for bearing with me and my long explanation and I really hope you enjoy the start of this fanfiction, I am putting my all into this and I have so much hope for how this can turn out, I love you all and until next time-Izzy**

 **Izzy's POV**

I press the button on the elevator and head up to the floor of the Behavioral Analysis Unit, I head up towards my future. I nervously rethink everything I have done this morning to prepare for this, including the outfit I picked out. I look down at my long sleeved purple sweater and my black pants, I look formal but suddenly feel like it's completely wrong. I pull on the sleeves so they cover my arms, I know that eventually it's going to come up, I mean it's in my file but I would still hate for that to be the first thing my new team knows about me. Just thinking about meeting these people makes me feel like I am intruding on everything they have, they all have known each other for years and here I come, a complete stranger that doesn't have half the experience they have. Coming from sex crimes I am walking into completely different territory, I am going to be apart of a widely respected and remarkable team that I have admired from afar for a long time. If it wasn't for Kate I wouldn't have even thought to apply, but she saw something in me and I believed her, even with the nerves talking I know that I can do this, the only problem is going to be if I will let the pressure get to me. I hear the ding of the elevator telling me that my fate is sealed, no going back now. I step off and walk through the doors and look around at everything in front of me, everything is so busy and there are people everywhere, they are all going my speed. I look around and notice that up the stairs is the closed door, it reads "Hotchner" I walk up the steps and knock on the door, I hear his voice from the other side giving me permission to come in, I open it up and see that he is sitting at his desk, when he notices who I am he stands up and comes over to shake my hand. "You must be Isabella Santiago"

"Yes" I shake his hand and can't stop myself before I correct him. "I actually go by Izzy" I am mortified, I can't believe I just corrected him like that. I try and study his face for any signs of hesitation, I try and catch any sign that I just made myself the definition for the worst first impressions.

"Yes, of course. It is very nice to meet you Izzy"

"Sorry if that sounded completely rude, I didn't mean to be a complete ass already, I am just so used to doing that all the time that I didn't even think before saying it"

"That is quite all right, I was not offended at all"

"I'm glad, I'm just a little nervous right now but I have always wanted the opportunity to work here"

"Well Kate spoke very highly of you, and your file is very impressive as well"

"Thank you sir" So he doesn't hate me, I mentally kick myself and pray that meeting everyone else will go better than this did. I look at his desk and see a picture of him with a little boy and a blond girl, they look so happy. Kate told me about Haley, I mean everyone in the bureau knew about what happened with him and Foyet but seeing that picture made everything more real. Kate told me a little bit about Hotch but from seeing him in person I can tell that while he has been through something tragic he doesn't let that define him, he may not show the most emotion but he cares very deeply for those who are close to him. Look at me, already profiling my team, I told myself that I wouldn't do this.

"Why don't we go meet the rest of the team" He walks out of the door and I follow his lead, we go down the stairs and head towards a group of people. There are three guys and two girls, the oldest guy is clearly David Rossi, one of the men who single handedly started this department. I look at the blond and the brunette who are laughing at something someone said, they are clearly close friends and I hope someday I could potentially be that close with them too. Hotch stops and I come to stand next to him, they all turn to me and suddenly I feel intimidated. "Everyone, this is Isabella Santiago, she has transferred from sex crimes and is here to join our team" I study all their faces, looking for some kind of reaction that is negative, but they all look very happy to meet me, I already like my team already.

"It's nice to meet you, I'm David Rossi" He extends his hand out to me and I shake it, I give him and smile and silently thank him with my eyes for making the first move.

"I'm Derek Morgan" The guy standing next to Rossi extends his hand out to me next, he gives me a big smile and I can tell he is a big flirt, a ladies man of the group. As I am shaking his hand I notice he is wearing a wedding ring, he still has charm but it's completely harmless, I can already tell he loves his wife deeply.

"I'm Jennifer Jareau but everyone calls me JJ" I shake her hand and she gives me a kind smile, I can tell that she is a very warm person and she seems welcoming. I notice that she too is wearing a wedding ring, along with a necklace that has two different birth stones on it, she is undoubtedly a mother. I look behind her to the desk she is leaning up against and see the picture of two young boys. The next woman with dark brown hair shakes my hand next.

"I'm Emily Prentiss" She is also kind and seems trusting, like you can tell her something and you know that she would never tell anyone. She reminds me a lot of my mother. There is only one person I haven't met yet, I finally take a good look at him and feel my pulse begin to race. He is tall and thin, his hair is curly and messy but it looks as if that was intentional, he is definitely handsome and I really hope that I'm not blushing.

"I'm Izzy" I mean to direct this comment at everyone but I can't take my eyes off him.

"I'm Doctor Spencer Reid" A doctor, of course he is a doctor. The first crush I have had in a long time has a PhD, it's very fitting. I extend my hand to him and notice he hesitates, everyone is looking at us and I feel like my blush is starting to show, did I do something wrong? Have I offended him? No one is saying anything and I am about to just apologize so this awkwardness can just end.

"Oh, Spence doesn't shake hands" JJ says, she doesn't say it in a mean way but with a laugh, as if it's just something they all know and can joke about. The way she calls him Spence lets me know that she is closest with him. He takes my hand and shake it, it's warm and he gives me a smile, I already know that I am smiling back.

"Spencer Reid shaking somebody's hand" Prentiss makes a big show of acting surprised, I can tell she is only doing it for effect but there is a hint of actual surprise in her voice. Morgan gets close to me.

"That must mean he likes you" Morgan laughs and Reid drops my hand, even after it's gone I can still feel the warmth. I can already tell that he is smart, and from his body language I can tell he has been hurt before, lost someone close to him, he sometimes has problems with letting people too close, I just hope I can break down those walls. I look and notice he is still looking at me, not in a creepy way but trying to figure me out the same way I am trying to figure him out.

"It's really nice to meet all of you, I have heard a lot about you guys from Kate but I am really excited to be joining this team"

"You know Kate?" Reid asks me, he must have been good friends with her while she worked with them.

"Yeah, we were in sex crimes together for a few years"

"How is she doing?" JJ asks.

"She's good, she really loves having the time off to spend with Meg and the new baby"

"Next time you talk to her tell her we miss her" JJ says and I can feel how close this team is, Kate wasn't even with them for very long and yet they still talk about her with so much excitement, they all really care about each other, no matter how short of a time they are together.

"I will" Suddenly everyone's phone goes off at the exact same time, must be about a case.

"It's Garcia, we have a case" Hotch says, they all start heading towards the stairs again, I follow them all into a room with a round table and eight chairs. Standing in front of the screens in the room is a blond woman with a bright yellow dress on, just from her outfit alone I can tell she has a big personality, and that everyone clearly loves her, it would be hard not too. "Penelope, I want you to meet our newest member Isabella Santiago"

"Hi, nice to meet you, I'm Izzy" I smile at her and extend my hand, she gives me the biggest smile and gladly shakes my hand.

"Oh my god it's so nice to meet you" I look at her and try and figure out her last name, Garcia is clearly Hispanic but she doesn't seem to fit the last name. "Where are you from?"

"I'm from California"

"And your last name and your beautiful tanned skin clearly means your Hispanic" I laugh.

"Yes, I'm Mexican"

"Finally, another person who understands our culture"

"Baby girl, your last name is from your step father, don't try and confuse the poor girl"

"Derek Morgan you better watch yourself or I will hurt you, and how will I explain that to that precious little baby of yours?" From the nickname he calls her I can tell they have a very flirtatious relationship, but the way she talks about his child makes me know that they are only friends and that she is clearly happy for him and his wife.

"Don't worry, I'm only half Mexican" Morgan laughs and I sit down in a chair next to Reid's.

"Garcia, the case?" Hotch says.

"Oh yes, we have a quite a doozy" Imagines of a woman's mugshot appear on the screen and next to them is multiple imagines of her dead body. "This is Abigail Hall, she is our first victim. She was murdered two weeks ago and was found outside a gated community in Manhattan New York, she was a prostitute and had been arrested before, hence why she was so easy to identify. She was strangled but had her chest cut up pretty badly"

"Was there any sign of sexual assault?" Reid asks.

"No, and there wasn't any sign on the second victim either, Taylor Jackson was found strangled with her chest cut outside a different gated community not to far from where the first body was found, and she was found just last night, she was also a prostitute"

"Is there any indication this is the same person?"

"That's what I was getting too sir, you see after the autopsy on Abigail it was shown that the cuts to her chest wasn't a form of stabbing but that she had her breast implants removed, Taylor also had breast implants that were removed as well"

"So that's his signature" Hotch says.

"He has to be targeting these woman, I mean how else would he know that they both had their breasts done?" Prentiss says to Hotch.

"Unless there could be more victims tied to this unsub that we don't about yet. Wheels up in 30" Hotch says and then he exits the room, everyone starts to stand up and Garcia is clearing the screen, she makes a face when looking directly at the murder scenes, even if I didn't already know she was the technical analysis that would be her tell.

"Welcome to the BAU" I whisper to myself as I stand up and follow the rest of my team.

I look through the case file as I listen to the rest of the team discuss and bounce ideas off each other, as a profiler I have to be observant, by listing to the way they are looking about this case I can figure out the best way I can help this team. I look up from the file and I look across to see Reid giving some facts and statistics, it is a little hard to focus on what he is saying, all I can keep staring at is his beautiful brown eyes. I am snapped out of the trance he put me in when Garcia's voice can be heard, she appears on the computer that sits on the table in front of us and I am interested in knowing what she has been able to find. "What do you have Garcia?" Hotch asks.

"I'm sorry sir but not a lot yet, I keep going through all the security footage from the cameras placed around these neighborhoods he has been dumping the bodies at but so far nothing and no one is raising any red flags"

"Keep us posted if you find anything, and run background checks on all the residents of both communities"

"Done and done" Her face disappears from the screen and I am back to feeling like I should say something, but also worried I'll say the wrong thing.

"So both these woman were just left out in the open, do you think our unsub could be a thrill killer? He gets off on the idea that he could be caught at any second?" Morgan asks.

"I don't think so, this was careful and planned out, this wasn't just an opportunity kill to get his blood pumping, it's almost like he is acting out a fantasy of some sort" Prentiss adds.

"And it looks like a very specific one at that. Both of these woman are blonds, out of all the prostitutes in the entire city and he kills two blonds, that isn't a coincidence" I say.

"So it's about a specific type of person then" JJ says.

"Or maybe these victims are just surrogates for the actual woman who revolves around his sick twisted fantasy" There is a hint of disgust in Morgan's voice as he speaks. It is a little reassuring that even after 12 years of being in the BAU there is still hope that the things we see can still bother us, it means were human.

"Are we thinking he's a sexual sadist? He butchered the breasts of these woman" Rossi looks like he is going to add more but Reid jumps in.

"I can't tell for sure yet but the lack of evidence of a sexual assault could point to signs of impotence, he may have wanted to assault her but couldn't, enraged he cut her to make up for what he was unable to do. In many cases the act of stabbing and or cutting can be a substitute of rape. It could also be very likely that he never meant to assault her in the first place, statistically prostitutes are more high risked targets and he could have easily wanted to feel what it was like to kill and he went with someone who wouldn't raise alarms if they were to go missing or end up dead"

"So your saying we could have an unsub who killed our first victim as a way to test if he liked killing in the first place?" Prentiss asks.

"And from the looks of our second victim he found his answer" Hotch says.

"And he found a way he likes to do so" I add.

"When we land I want Rossi and Morgan to go to the scene of the crime, JJ and Pretniss I want you to come to the station to get set up and help me interview the victims families" Hotch turns to face me now. "Reid, I want you and Izzy to go to meet with the M.E." Reid nods his head and I do the same. I close the file and go over to find something to drink, my mouth suddenly feels dry and I don't know if it's from nerves or from flying. I am looking for a bottle of water and when I look back up I almost spill the water all over myself, Reid is standing right there in front of me. He must notice the look of surprise on my face because he suddenly looks worried, his face scrunches up and I know he thinks he's done something wrong.

"I'm so sorry, did I scare you?"

"No, your fine. I just didn't expect you to be standing here, that's all" I laugh a little and he gives me a smile, his face relaxes again, I know I shouldn't be profiling my team like this but something about Spencer Reid just makes me want to know everything about him, why not put my skills to use to try and figure him out for myself?

"Well I'm glad I didn't scare you, I wouldn't want you to be scared off so soon" He gives me a small smile and I can't help but let out a little laugh, I think he just made a joke and I can tell that is something out of his comfort zone.

"I don't scare very easily, I mean why else would I go into a job involving serial killers?" It takes him a second but finally he realizes I made a joke, he must think it was funny because he laughs too and even though I know it was terrible he actually looks like he thought it was funny.

"I just wanted to come over and make sure you had everyone's numbers already, I wasn't sure if you did or not because I don't have yours yet-" He looks like he may be a little nervous, I can tell by the way he starts babbling on, but in a cute way.

"Are you asking me for my number?" I tease him.

"No, I mean not no, I mean yes, just not in that way you are thinking" He is babbling.

"Spencer, I'm just making a joke. I actually don't have anyone but Hotch's number yet ,so it would be really helpful if you could send them to me?" I touch his arm when I say his name and he doesn't shy away. I don't feel any tenseness and that's a good sign.

"Yeah, I could do that" He pulls out his phone and I take it from his hands, as I take the phone I feel his fingertips brush mine and I feel electric. I hope he doesn't notice the way my hands shake slightly as I type in my phone number. I hand him back his phone and pick up my water.

"Thank you"

"Yeah, no problem" I give him a smile and go back to sit down. As soon as I sit down I notice the way Morgan is looking back and forth between the two of us, but what I notice more is Reid's not so subtle glances at me.

We stand in front of the corpse that is our victim, I watch the way Reid stares intently at the body, I notice how focused he is. His body language alone paints a picture of who he is, he is hyper aware of everything and is trying to find the answers to this case from what this poor girl's killer left behind. Every inch of his body shows how focused he is, from the way he crinkles his forehead to the slight movement in his fingers. The doctor walks in holding the chart and Reid reaches out to take it, immediately he starts reading over the chart at hyper speed, he flips through the pages quickly, retaining every single word that quickly. Kate told me that he was able to read that fast but hearing about it and seeing it are two completely different things. "Have you figured out cause of death yet?" Reid asks.

"Yes, strangulation is what killed her"

"So the blood loss from the cutting on her chest didn't speed up the process?" I ask, I am out of my territory here, working in sex crimes there is usually a living victim to deal with. Some say that the live ones are the hardest but there is no advantage either way, we can't ask her anything about what happened to her. It looks like the doctor is about to say something when Reid holds up the chart for me.

"Izzy, look at this" He point to the section he wants me to read and I have to read it over twice just to make sure I got it correctly.

"He removed the implants anti-mortem?" I ask the doctor.

"That is correct"

"So he wanted her to feel the pain he was inflicting on her. He gets off on torturing them"

"But then why strangle them? Bleeding out would be a much slower and more painful way to die. It's almost like he tortures them, and the realizes what he has done and quickly ends their suffering"

"So he feels remorse" As if psychopaths could actually be capable of having the emotion of remorse.

"What was she strangled with?" Reid asks.

"The markings on her neck could indicate that it was a type of belt, there is impressions in her neck that would match wearing a belt too tightly"

"Did you find any DNA under her fingernails?"

"I checked but there wasn't any DNA found" This happens sometimes, it's always rough but you see it more times than not.

"And was there any traces of drugs in her system?" I ask, if I was being cut opened and didn't scratch the hell out of the son of a bitch attacking me then it would be because I physically wasn't able or drugged.

"There wasn't any type of drug found in her system"

"He must be strong then, a man who is able to hold a fully alert woman down while cutting her while she is still alive has to be strong" I look at Reid and he is inspecting the cuts on her chest, he is looking at the the incisions the unsub made. "Was there any trace of DNA on the second victim?" I am always hopeful that there will be one time where they might mess up, just once is all we need to nail to their ass.

"No, same as the first victim" Reid suddenly stands up and walks over to the second victim, he inspects her chest and then her neck and then comes back over to the first victim and does the same thing all over again.

"What is it?"

"I think I found something. On the first victim there is clear signs of hesitation marks on her neck, that is consistent with what we initially thought about how he was testing out his preferred form of killing and how he was going to do that, and on the second victim's neck there are no hesitation marks"

"Exactly, because he is already comfortable with how to kill"

"But the thing that doesn't make sense is that on both victims there are no hesitation marks whatsoever on the chest, he made exactly the right incisions that he would need in order to remove their breast implants"

"How is that possible? He butchered them, there is marks all over the place"

"But even the ones that are meant to look like he was messing up are precise, and from the looks of the incisions I can tell he didn't use a knife but a scalpel"

"So our unsub is a doctor"

"I believe so, he has at the very minimum the right knowledge and training of how to not only preform procedures correctly but he knows how to make it look like he had no idea what he was doing"

"So he is smart, that is the worst type of dangerous"

"So you think he is a doctor?" Hotch asks Reid.

"He has to have at least gone to medical school and been there long enough to get actual practice on operating, he is precise and that isn't something you can just do perfectly without any kind of practice" Reid goes over to the board and draws circles on his map, while talking with JJ and Prentiss and Hotch about this case I have been taking glaces at Reid as he works, I can tell he gives it his all in everything he does, no matter how small the task. He makes geographic profiling look like the easiest thing in the world, he is so consumed with this project that it actually started me when he started talking to Hotch. "From the disposal sights of each victim and the surrounding areas between where both victims were known to work I can tell that this specific area has to be the comfort zone" Reid is showing us the distance that the unsub is comfortable killing at, while it is helpful to narrow down our search it still is a lot of area to cover. Hotch's phone begins to ring, he answers it and puts it on speakerphone.

"Garcia, your on speakerphone"

"And Morgan isn't here right now" Prentiss adds which earns a laugh from JJ.

"Alright, I'll be on my best behavior"

"Have you found anything about our unsub?" Reid asks. He called her in the car to tell her to limit her search to doctors or people who attended medical school in the surrounding area of where the bodies were found.

"With the information you gave me earlier boy wonder, I wasn't able to narrow down the search much at all. Doctors in the surrounding area between where both bodies were found is a whopping 15,873 and while narrowing my search to only men brings it down a little at 12,642 it is still a lot of potential weirdos"

"Garcia, look for guys that are strong, so with an athletic build" JJ says.

"And try and even find people that were in medical school but never graduated, having these skills doesn't necessarily mean that he became a doctor" Reid suggests.

"Well that doesn't make my job any easier, but I'll do my very best"

"Thank you Garcia" Prentiss says and there is a click from the other end. Just then Morgan and Rossi walk in.

"Did you find anything at the crime scene?" Hotch asks them.

"No, there wasn't anything that he left behind, this son of a bitch is good" Morgan answers for both him and Rossi.

"Did you two find anything at the M.E.?" Rossi asks Reid and I.

"Reid found evidence to support that he might be a doctor, or have some medical training" I give to them.

"No wonder he is so careful, he knows that his DNA would come up, that could be a reason he hasn't assaulted them"

"Something about the fact that he isn't assaulting them isn't sitting right with me, working in sex crimes it was the prostitutes who were easier targets. I mean they would already have a lot of men's DNA on them so it would be harder to sort out from their johns to the unsub, and working girls can sometimes feel like they would have a harder time reporting an assault because they think we have a bias for them because of what they do"

"That's a good point, but we know that he didn't have any other interest in them but to kill, that is his goal and he is officiant and organized. He has one goal and one goal only" Prentiss emphasizes this, I can tell she is frustrated that we aren't getting anywhere.

"But why steal the implants? Why take those when he just wanted to strangle them?"

"Maybe he didn't want us to be able to ID them, all breast implants, and any implants of any kind have a serial number on them, they can easily be traced back to the patient" Reid says to me.

"That is a possibility, what did you guys get from the family members?" I ask JJ and Pretniss.

"I talked to the mother of our first victim, Abigail, what she told me was that Abigail was a runaway and had very little contact with her until a couple of months ago" JJ answers for me.

"I got basically the same thing from Taylor's sister, she told me that she saw her a few times a year but was mostly absent from her life" Prentiss adds.

"If they both were absent from their families then how did they afford the implants?" I ask.

"My best guess is they had to be gifts from their pimps, Rossi and I checked out these girls apartments and they weren't living off much" Morgan tells us.

"Morgan, call Garcia and tell her to find out who paid for these girls surgeries, if it was their pimps and he suddenly decided he wanted to kill them he might have wanted his money back" Hotch tells Morgan.

"But that wouldn't fit with the perfect incisions" Reid directs his comment at Hotch.

"This is the best we have go on right now" Just then his phone goes off, I know it's not Garcia because Morgan just stepped out of the room to call her, I sit there patiently waiting like everyone else. When Hotch gets off the phone he turns to us and his facial expression is more serious than it usually is. "There's been another murder, they just found the body outside of another gated community"

"He must be escalating, this is his second kill in less than 24 hours" JJ points out.

"Hopefully he slipped up this time"

Reid holds up the police tape for me so I can slip through, I hear the sounds of reporters begging for any word on who the victim is and what we are doing to find the killer, vultures. I give Reid a small smile as a thank you but that quickly fades when I see the condition of our latest victim, she is not yet covered with a white sheet and I can barley make out what she looks like based on the massive injuries that she sustained. "He beat her to a bloody pulp this time" I mean to say it just to myself but say it out loud instead.

"This is clearly overkill" Reid points out. I am about to ask if we are sure this is the same guy when I notice the slashes to her breasts and the faint lines around her neck indicating she had been strangled.

"And clearly our unsub's type" I motion to her blond hair and his eyes follow my gaze. "But why beat her up and then still preform the same ritual?" I ask.

"That must be what's important to him"

"So what did she do that got her beat up so badly?"

"Maybe she didn't give him the gratification that he looks for from his victims so he beat it out of her"

"Whatever it is, this is a clear sign that he is unraveling, he is either going to kill more to boost his confidence or go right to the real object of his rage" I watch as they cover her with a sheet and then I look around, there are many people standing around watching us intently. These people who pay thousands of dollars to live in a nice neighborhood where these types of things shouldn't happen, where these types of people shouldn't be in the first place. Then it hits me, I think I might have figured out something major about this case. "That's it" I say out loud.

"What is?" Reid asks me with a puzzled expression.

"I think I know why he is leaving them outside these nice neighborhoods, somehow he knows that they are able to afford these expensive procedures, so in his mind they must have some money, excuse my French but he sees these woman as whores who don't belong in the same social class, he must be someone who lives in these type of areas and he wants to expose these woman for who they really are"

"So he must be a doctor, he must live in one of these communities around the area and that's how he is able to afford it. The real object of his rage must have done something for him to deem her a whore to him, he is starting small by punishing these prostitutes with a little bit of money but soon that isn't going to be good enough. We need to get back and add this so we can help build the profile" We both rush from the crime scene back to the car and I feel a wave of relief wash over me, I can actually do this.

We all sit around the table bouncing ideas back and forth from each other, it is late and I take another swig of my coffee to try and keep my eyes open. For all we know this guy could be out hunting for his next victim at this very moment, there is no time to be tired. "What did you get from Quinn's family" I ask again, sometimes it is just easier to go over everything again to make sure you didn't miss something that has been staring at you right in the face the whole time. Quinn is the name of the last victim we found, the one who's face was almost unrecognizable to her sister that ID'ed the body.

"That she wasn't super close to her family but got the breast implants when she was in her late teens, her sister didn't know where she got the money for them and her boyfriend didn't know much about it either" JJ answers for me. At the sound of hearing the word 'boyfriend' I can feel the sleep leave my body and I sit up a little straighter.

"She had a boyfriend?" I ask.

"Yeah, Morgan interviewed him, he had an alibi for her time of death and was pretty shaken up over it"

"That is pretty strange for a prostitute to have a boyfriend, was she open with him about her work?" I ask.

"He knew, he wasn't very happy about it but she told him she was going to quit so they could get married soon"

"Did she have an engagement ring?"

"No, he hadn't bought her one yet"

"Maybe that's why he beat her up, maybe she pleaded for her life and thought by saying she had something to live for, someone to live for that he would let her go" I suggest.

"You think she was trying to tap into his empathy?" Morgan poses this question.

"Maybe, but she didn't know that would just fuel his rage, I think he beat her up because she was in a relationship yet still working, he values monogamy and when he found out she had broken that he just lost it. That has been what we've been missing, he doesn't assault them because he must be married or in a long term committed relationship and views that as cheating on her" I say. I wait for their reactions, anything to indicate that they agree with me.

"And she could be the one who has cheated on him, that's why he is exposing these woman like you suggested, he is building up the courage to expose her once and for all" Prentiss says.

"I think it's time to deliver the profile" I announce, suddenly I don't feel so tired after all.

We stand in a line and all eyes are on us, my team. Everyone is waiting patiently for us to deliver the highly anticipated profile. "Our unsub is a white male in his late 30's to early 40's. He is most likely a doctor and probably drives an expensive car, dresses nicely and is all about appearance" Hotch starts us off.

"He is easily someone that would look desirable to a prostitute so after scoping out the scene and finally deciding on his next victim he would approach them and they would assume they could make a lot of money from him. He is handsome and likes control and order, we can tell that from his crime scenes and the same can be said for his personal life" Rossi continues.

"He is in a committed relationship and values that, but the same can't be said for his partner, it has most likely come to his attention recently that she hasn't been as faithful and since he can no longer control her the way he desires he has turned to killing these woman that remind him of her, he is most likely married to a blond or someone who was blond when they first met" Prentiss continues.

"He views these prostitutes the same way he views her, like whores who need to be exposed for who they truly are. His recent kill can indicate that he is most likely unraveling, this makes him both dangerous and unpredictable. He could keep killing to satisfy his urges to lash out at the true object of his rage or he could decide he has enough confidence already and practice to take care of her once and for all" I add.

"While his last victim was a clear sign of overkill he couldn't help but still take the time to remove her breast implants, this is his compulsion, there is something about this that he is fixated on and he can't help but do this to all his victims" JJ says.

"From the evidence that all three victims had breast implants means that he knows them personally or had personal information about them previous to their murder and he used that to pick them. And from all the dump sights and the area between them and notorious spots where prostitutes work can indicate that he lives in the area himself" Reid adds.

"While he knows he has messed up we can predict that he won't care, he will think that he is too careful to get caught and he will continue with his same patterns he has exhibited already" Morgan finishes.

"Thank you" Hotch concludes and we all head back into the other room. I am looking at the pictures when I hear JJ swear from behind me.

"Damn it" She says.

"What is it?" Reid asks her.

"The information about the sophisticated cuts on the victims chests got leaked to the press, they put two and two together and figured out he is a doctor. They are having a field day with this and even nicknamed him The Botch Doctor"

"This is really going to boost his ego" Pretniss says, with unsub's like this who no longer feel important because of someone or something always get off on all the attention, and now that they have given him a name it will take his ego to a whole new level. The phone rings and Morgan answers it.

"What do you got for us mamma?"

"I ran three victims names through my data base looking for information about who paid for their boob jobs and about what doctors preformed their surgeries. I have three different doctors and three different names on the credit cards"

"I know you didn't call us if you didn't have anything" Morgan flirts back at her.

"And you are correct my delicious cup of hot coco, while I didn't find any matches on the plastic surgeons they all went to the same hospital"

"There we go"

"Garcia, run a list of all the plastic surgeons that work at that hospital, minus the three we already have" Reid asks.

"I'm running the names, and we have narrowed it down to about 20, give me something else"

"Try and find doctors who are in their late 30's to early 40's"

"That still only brings it down to 15" We are all racking our brains for a connection between these three victims, there is obviously something there but there has to be an easier way to narrow this down.

"Garcia, why don't you try and find doctors that are in a higher position than just surgeons. This guy is about control and order, he must has some experience overseeing some doctors, and that would make sense as to why he would have access to patients that aren't his own and be able to see their files"

"I'm doing that and it narrowed it down to two different people, one is a Lenard Anderson but he is in his late 60's and is near retirement age, so this is probably not our unsub, so that leaves us with 39 year old Robert Dawson, he will actually be taking over for Lenard when he retires and Dawson would have access to our victims files"

"See if he is married"

"Checking, Richard Dawson is married to a Lisa Dawson, they have been married for 15 years, uh oh" She stops midway through her sentence.

"Baby girl, what is it?"

"Lisa just recently filed for divorce two weeks ago"

"So right when the killings began, I think we just found our trigger"

"And from her picture from her licence I can see she is a blond just like all three of our victims, and it gets worse. She was a patient of Richard's 16 years ago, she came in for breast implants and that must be where they met"

"So he is going after woman that remind him of his wife in all aspects" I say.

"That must be why he is taking out their implants, it's as if he is symbolically removing what bound them together in the first place" Reid says to me.

"Garcia, I need you to send me Lisa's phone number, he could have been set off by the fact that we are on to him and he might take his chance now, I will call her from the car. Rossi, Morgan and Izzy, I want you to come with me. JJ, Prentiss and Reid you follow behind, we have to try and get to her before it is to late" I nod my head and follow Hotch and Morgan and Rossi outside of the station and into the car. Morgan is driving and I am sitting in the back, I can feel my adrenaline already pumping, I can hear the sound of the sirens coming from our car and the one behind us that has the rest of our team, that Reid is in. I can't let myself get distracted by him right now, a woman's life is on the line. I hear Garcia giving us the address over speakerphone as Morgan speeds to get there, Hotch has tried calling her phone three times now and still no answer. Soon we pull up to the second neighborhood where the body of our second victim was found, we were so close, so close to him the whole time. Morgan stops the car and all of us jump out, I strap on my vest and pull my gun out, I am ready for this. We split up and Reid, Morgan, Hotch and I are going up to the front of the house while JJ, Prentiss, and Rossi and headed towards the back. We walk up to the door with our weapons drawn and Morgan knocks on the door.

"Richard Dawson, this is the FBI and I need you to open this door" There is no answer and Morgan breaks the door down, we all rush in and can hear the cries of a woman's voice coming from the living room, we walk in and find blood on the floor, Richard is holding a knife to her throat and I can see the starts of cuts on her chest.

"Back up! All of you need to back up right now or I'll kill her!" He is screaming, we all back up a few inches but keep our weapons directed at him.

"Richard, we know you love your wife, you don't want to her hurt her" Morgan directs to him, he is trying to make him remember why he didn't hurt her before this in the first place.

"You don't know me, and it doesn't matter if I loved her, she is just a stupid bitch who couldn't keep the vows she promised me"

"That must have been pretty painful to find out about what she did to you" I try.

"You don't have any idea about what she did!"

"I know it was wrong, when you marry someone you make a promise, and she stood in front of all your friends and family and promised you that she would never cheat on you and then she goes and embarrasses you"

"She humiliated me, I risked everything to be with her, my family knew the whole time she wasn't right for me. She was just some trashy whore who tried to be something she is not, she had to go and get surgery to try and pretend she actually was like me, that she actually belongs in a house like this"

"So you had to expose her, you wanted her to know what she did and you want everyone else to know too, that you were right"

"Of course, of course I'm right"

"Lisa, why don't you apologize to him, tell him how sorry you are"

"Richard, I I'm so so sorry" Her voice is shaking through her words, she is terrified.

"He doesn't know how much you actually mean it, he needs to know you are sincere, Richard, let her face you when she owns up to her mistakes"

"This better not be some kind of trick! If it is I will kill her right here in front of all of you!" He is getting angry again, I hope my team knows what I am doing because we only get one chance to make this work.

"It's not a trick, I promise. I just want you to be able to see how sorry she is, how much she really means it" He nods his head as a indication that he understands what I mean. He lowers the knife to let her turn to face him, as she is Morgan takes the shot and the bullet goes into his shoulder and he drops the knife as he falls to the ground, he is screaming out in pain and Lisa runs away from him and into my arms. I hug her tightly and keep apologizing. "I'm so sorry, I just had to say that so he would let his guard down" I don't know if she understands or not because she is crying too hard. She is still bleeding pretty heavily and Reid must notice.

"We need a medic in here" He pages and Morgan is finished handcuffing Richard and they are both standing up now.

"Your damn right I need a medic" He spews.

"You will be fine" Morgan barks at him. He is trying to control him but he keeps thrashing around, he manages to turn to face me and spits in my direction.

"You lying bitch, you are all the same"

"That's enough" Reid says in a tone I have never heard from him, he sound angry and protective all at the same time. I watch as Morgan walks him out, he killed three woman, three people that didn't deserve to die. No matter what there are always going to be the ones you can't save, I try not to think about that too much as I feel Lisa clinging onto me tightly, I hold onto the one we did save and it feels pretty good.

I look out at the night sky and all the clouds, I am so tired but I can't seem to fall asleep. I am focused on all the lights from the city we are leaving below as Hotch comes to sit down in front of me. "I just wanted to tell you that you did excellent today, you helped save that woman's life"

"Thank you sir, it means a lot"

"And your attention to detail while working on building the profile, Reid said you figured out he wanted to shame his victims by leaving them to be found around nice areas" I don't know what to say, Reid made sure that Hotch knew where to give the credit, that is the sweetest thing.

"I just used what I learned from the rest of the team, you have a good one"

"Yes, we do" I notice the way he uses the word 'we' indicating that it's just as much my team as it is his now. Hotch gets up and leaves the seat in front of me empty again, I wonder why at first but then Reid comes over with two cups in his hand.

"Would you like some tea?" I laugh out of a mix of exhaustion and relief that it isn't coffee, I don't think I should be drinking any this late, I will be up for hours.

"Yes, thank you" He sits down across from me and I realize how it's just the two of us back here, the rest of the team is talking with each other, just enjoying the simplicity of getting to spend time with each other without the stress of an unsub at the moment. I take and sip and feel the warmth rush through me. "Thank you again"

"It's just tea, it was no big deal, really"

"Not just for the tea, but what you told Hotch. That was really sweet of you"

"Oh, well you deserved it. You were spot on with that whole idea that he just wanted to show how out of place they were and how they never really could be like the people who live in those communities"

"Yeah" I try not to let him detect the change in my voice and demeanor, I don't want him to know how I knew that.

"Are you okay?" He already noticed.

"Yeah, I'm okay"

"If you don't want to talk about it that's fine"

"No, it's okay. I just was able to come up with that so easily because I grew up in a nice neighborhood in L.A, my father is a doctor and my mom an immigrant from Mexico. They married young and during that time my dad was building his career as a very successful doctor, since I lived in a nice area I went to a nice private school but not all of the kids there were so accepting, it's hard enough being a half Mexican, you don't feel like you fit in with the white kids because your too Mexican for them, but anywhere when I was in high school a rumor went around that the only reason I could afford the tuition was because I was a prostitute. It wasn't even a very clever rumor or anything but I heard a lot about being a 'whore who didn't belong where I shouldn't be able to afford'" I know I shouldn't have told him any of this, we just met and he doesn't need to know the depths of my high school trauma, I mean I shouldn't have even said anything in the first place. This isn't even the worst of it.

"I'm really sorry, that must have been terrible. When I was in high school I got lured to go meet one of the pretty and popular girls and they blindfolded me, told me it was going to be fun. When they put the blindfold on me she stated taking off my shirt and that is when I heard the laughing, it was all a huge joke and they striped me and tied me up while they all laughed" He just told me something equally as personal, he must really trust me already, or want to.

"Spencer, I am so sorry" I unknowingly place my hand on his leg, when we both notice what I've done I am worried he will try and move away from my grasp, but he doesn't. I take my hand off his leg and take another sip of my tea, I look behind him and see Morgan keeps making glances at us when he thinks we won't notice.

"It's okay, now you know something equally as traumatizing that I went though"

"Well, if it makes you feel better I definitely wasn't popular or pretty when I was in high school"

"I don't believe that, because you are pretty" He says it matter of factly and I feel a slight blush creep to my cheeks, I smile as I take another sip of the tea.

"You are the genius" This makes him smile and he wouldn't even have to say anything else right now, because everything is already perfect.


	2. Taken

**Reid's POV**

I am sitting at my desk looking through the case files from the case we just closed when I see her walk in, she sets her bag down and then smiles over at JJ and Prentiss who begins having a conversation with. I see her smiling and I feel my heart begin to beat a little bit faster. I set down the file and put it into one of my drawers and decide to get up and go talk to her, watching from afar is starting to get creepy. I stand up and try and run my hands through my hair real quickly. I walk over to them and I watch as her face lights up when I get closer, that must be a good sign. "Hi Spencer" Izzy says to me.

"Hey Spence" JJ says to me.

"Hi" I say to all three of them. I smile at Izzy and she smiles back at me. I get that feeling in the pit of my stomach again, that feeling I haven't had since Maeve. Izzy moves her hair behind her ear and I feel like I've made the situation awkward, something I seem to do often. I am about to say something when Garcia races in.

"Where is the rest of the team?" She asks.

"I think Hotch is in his office, same with Rossi but I haven't seen Morgan yet" I answer for her. Just then Morgan walks in with coffee in his hand.

"Sorry I'm late, Hank was up most of the night" He takes a sip of coffee but then notices the look on Garcia's face. "Penelope, what's wrong?"

"We have a case, and we need to hurry and get the team together right now"

"I'll get Hotch and Rossi, I'll meet you all in the briefing room in a minute" Morgan puts his arm around Garcia and tries to clam her down a little, Prentiss goes over to the stairs and heads towards Hotch and Rossi's offices and JJ follows behind Morgan and Garcia leaving Izzy and I.

"We should hurry, I haven't know her long but Garcia really seems to be shaken up by this and we shouldn't keep her waiting. Just let me take my coat off, you don't have to wait for me" She gives me a smile.

"I'll wait for you, it's not problem at all. Let me help you with that" I say and I help her take her coat off, she smiles at me.

"Thank you"

"Your welcome. Your hair looks very nice today" I try, just anything to keep the conversation going on a little longer.

"Thank you, we'll talk more later" She smiles and I follow her up the stairs and into the room. I sit down in the chair next to her's and Prentiss is on my other side. Garcia stands in front of the monitor ready to give us our newest case.

"Just this morning outside a doctors office here in Virgina a Mary Gibson was found laying next to her car with her stomach bloody and cut open, she was unconscious and found by a doctor who was walking out to their car. She was 8 1/2 months pregnant"

"Was?" JJ asks.

"When she was found the baby was gone, it looks like the unsub preformed a c-section of her in the parking lot, she passed out from shock and loss of blood, she was rushed to the hospital and after surgery is now stable"

"Was the baby developed enough to have survived?" Hotch asks.

"The doctors believe so, as long as he didn't die when he was removed from the mother" Garcia says.

"So there could be a baby out there, meaning we are treating this as a kidnapping. Garcia I need you to go through security camera footage at the doctors office, Prentiss and Rossi I want you two to go to the doctors office and look at the crime scene, Morgan and JJ I need you to interview everyone who was there and could have saw anything, Reid and Izzy you come with me to the hospital to interview Mary and ask her about what she remembers" We all get up from the table and head outside to go get into the cars.

 **Izzy's POV**

I sit in the back of the car while Reid sits in the front, Hotch is driving faster than I sure is the legal limit but it doesn't matter, a woman's baby has been taken, physically ripped out of her womb, it's too important to worry about safe driving. Silence fills the car and I have time to think about Reid's behavior this morning, it was definitely out of the ordinary but very sweet. Seeing him trying so hard made me know he must care, it's nice that he is trying so much for me, I can't remember the last time someone did that. Hotch pulls in and we are all getting out of the car, we go inside and show our badges to the nurses and are lead up to Mary's room. When we go in she is propped up on in bed with her head leaning against her pillow, her husband is holding onto her hand as she sobs into his shoulder, her body rocks with sobs and I can hear her wince from pain, it must be hard to move her body after being ripped open like that. "Mrs. Gibson, I'm SSA Hotchner and this is SSA Santiago and Dr. Spencer Reid, were with the FBI"

"Have you found my baby?" She chokes out.

"Have you found our son?" The husband asks, he is crying too. They are both worried about their son and my heart breaks for them.

"We haven't yet, we just came to ask you a couple of questions and see if you remember anything that will be able to help us find him. Can you tell us what you remember from this morning?" She is crying heavily and she takes a few deep breaths before answering, trying to gain some composure.

"I woke up and went straight to the doctors, I made an early appointment so I could go shopping with my friend later. When I got to the doctors office there wasn't many people there, the appointment didn't take very long, they just needed to draw some blood and then checked on the baby to make sure he was okay" Just at the mere mention of her son she dissolves into tears again.

"I know this is hard but do you remember what happened when you were leaving?" She takes another moment again and then continues talking.

"When I was leaving the parking lot was pretty empty, I didn't see anyone when I was walking to my car"

"Do you remember what happened when you were attacked?"

"I was about to get into the car, the door was opened and I was standing on the drivers side when I felt something large hit my head, I must have fallen to the ground because that's what I remember next, then someone was holding my legs down because I remember struggling, I stopped when I felt them cutting into me" She puts her hand over her stomach. "Just this morning he was inside of me but now he is gone" She is crying again.

"What is your son's name?" I offer, trying to get anything to make her feel better about the situation.

"Luke, his name is Luke"

"That's a nice name"

"Thank you, it's after my father, he died a couple of years ago"

"I'm so sorry about that, I promise you that we are going to do everything we can to find your son and bring him back to you" I don't know if I've overstepped my bounds but I can't stand to just watch this poor woman suffer without giving her anything to hold onto.

"Thank you"

"Did you see who attacked you? Do you remember anything about them?" Hotch asks her.

"I don't, I'm sorry" She is apologizing but Hotch assures her that she is okay.

"Why don't you try and get some rest, we will tell you about anything we find" Hotch tells her, she nods her head and Hotch motions for Reid and I to follow him out to the hall.

"What are you thinking?" I ask Hotch.

"What we all assume, that our unsub is a woman, specifically one who can't have children or lost her own"

"I was thinking the same thing" I agree with him, it would make the most sense that our unsub is a woman. I study Reid's face and can tell something isn't sitting right with him.

"What is it Reid?" Hotch asks him, he must notice the same thing that I've noticed in him.

"I know that everything fits with our unsub being a woman but what I don't understand is that the attack isn't that like of a woman, woman aren't usually messy, their crimes are usually clean and if this woman is looking to have a child then she wouldn't have attacked the mother like that, by attacking the mother there could be risk to the child that was still inside her, if this woman really wanted a child that bad or has convinced herself that child belongs to her then she would have made sure both the mother and baby would have been safe to give the child the best chance he could have"

"Why don't you talk to the doctors and try and get some more information about how she was cut and the state she was left in, Izzy and I will head back in there and talk with the husband, it's too early to do a cognitive interview with the victim but we can ask the husband about anything happening recently" Reid nods and then walks away to find the doctor, I follow Hotch back into the room where a nurse is now standing next to the bed, the sound of crying is now gone and Mary's eyes are closed, her husband is still holding her hand. "Mr. Gibson, if we could we would like to ask you some questions"

"Of course" He answers.

"If you want we can step outside not to wake her"

"Don't worry about that, the nurse had to sedate her because they were afraid she would break her stitches, she was crying too hard"

"We can talk right here then. Do you remember anyone following you in the past few weeks or anyone making Mary uncomfortable, anyone being too invested in Mary's pregnancy?"

"I can't remember anything specifically, I mean there are always people who want to touch her stomach even if she doesn't want them too but that happens to everyone, do you think whoever took our son knew us? Knew Mary"

"That's a possibility, this type of attack isn't opportunistic, it was planned, this person must have known that Mary had a doctors appointment this morning, followed her and waited for her to be alone"

"I can't think of anyone, I'm sorry"

"It's okay, we will contact you if we find any new information"

"Thank you, just please find our son" He walks back into the hospital room and I see Reid walking back down the hall towards us with a file in his hand.

"Find anything?" I ask him.

"From what the doctors found I can tell that whoever the unsub is they didn't have any medical knowledge but had enough to know how to successfully remove the baby without harming him, there was evidence that it was a clean cut and none of her organs were damaged. But what still bugs me is that it was still very messy, something uncommon found with a female unsub"

"We will go over it with the team before we give the profile" Hotch offers him. Hotch starts to walk away and we follow, we are a little farther behind Hotch so I can talk to Reid a little privately.

"Don't worry, we will see what the team thinks, I'm sure your on to something"

"I just hate that we can't give a profile sooner, if we are considering this a kidnapping case most children are killed within the first 24 hours"

"I know, but not having all the right information could cause a false profile and that won't help anyone"

"I just hope it's not too late" I rub his arm and try and make him feel better.

"Don't beat yourself up over this" He gives me a weak smile and we are walking out of the hospital and getting back into the car.

We walk into the briefing room and everyone is sitting around the table, there is a dry erase board already in there and there is writing on it, a list of who the unsub could be. "Rossi, Prentiss did you find anything at the crime scene?"

"There wasn't any DNA or anything the unsub left behind" Prentiss answers.

"JJ or Morgan did you get anything from anyone who was there?"

"No one remembered seeing anything or hearing anything, all we got was an account of what the doctor saw who found her out by her car, she said that she know Mary and recognized her and thought it was odd that her car was still there even though her appointment was over 20 minutes ago"

"So we don't have much to work with, where is Garcia?" Hotch asks, just then Garcia comes in ready to show us the footage from the doctors office security footage.

"I am right here sir" Garcia says and then goes over to turn the screen on. "This is the footage from the doctors office, there isn't much to go on as the car was parked father way from where the camera, I'm sorry I couldn't find more"

"It's okay, this just further adds to what we already thought about this being planned"

"If we can't find much evidence then we will have to rely on the profile we have to build" Rossi offers.

"So what do we have so far?" Morgan asks.

"It's most likely a white female in late 30's early 40's, she is unable to have children or had a child that was taken from her or died" JJ says.

"Yes, but there was something about the crime scene that looks like it was a male unsub" Reid says, he is sticking to his gut feeling.

"Okay, let's say it is a male unsub, then what would be the reasoning behind this?" I offer, I don't want to shut his idea down but I know we all will need more of an explanation as to why he thinks it's a male unsub.

"Well both Mary and her husband have blonde hair and blue eyes, children with blonde hair and blue eyes are going to be sold more on the black market" Morgan says.

"Yes but if they needed a baby the unsub could have simply stolen a baby that was already born, why take the time to cut out a baby from the mother" JJ says.

"Maybe the unsub was on a deadline, maybe they needed a baby exactly today" Prentiss says.

"This isn't helping anything, we need to focus on what Mary said during her interview" Reid says and then turns to the white board, he is starting to get frustrated. "What is it that we already know about this unsub?" He asks the team. He begins writing on the white board as she speaks. "This unsub is organized and goal oriented, they have little or basic knowledge about some medical information, specifically how to safely remove the unborn child out of the womb"

"They have to be strong, I mean Mary said the unsub was able to hold her legs down while cutting into her, you would have to be pretty strong in order to hold down someones legs and their torso at the same time" I say. Thinking about that now something really isn't adding up, most woman are short and while they can be strong it is unlikely that they can be careful and precise while focusing on holding down her legs along with the rest of her body.

"That's right, I can't believe I didn't see it before. Guys it's a team"

"A team?" Hotch questions.

"Yes, we weren't wrong when we initially profiled the unsub as a woman, but what if she knew that she couldn't complete the task herself, so she got a partner, a man" Reid says, he sounds more relaxed, like he finally figured out exactly what has been bugging him.

"And that is why the crime itself didn't fit the profile of a female unsub, it must be the man who had the medical knowledge or the woman who was telling him exactly what to do" Hotch comments. "We need to give the profile"

We stand in our office with eyes from the local police all on us, I've stood with my team and given profiles before but this seems different, we are standing in front of people in our own city trying to find a missing baby. Hotch starts speaking to start the profile. "Our unsub is a team of a white female in her mid to late 30's or early 40's and a white male in mid to late 30's. Our female unsub is going to be the dominate one in this partnership, we believe it was her idea to steal the baby and now that he is in her possession she will do everything in her power to ensure she does not loose him"

"Our female unsub is smart and the crime was goal oriented, she had been planning this so it's likely the victim knows one or both of the unsubs. Something about Mary Gibson's child made her fixated on having him. We believe she may be under the delusion that this is her own child or was always meant to be her child" Prentiss follows.

"The unsub has some medical training or at least knowledge on the subject, from the way that Mary Gibson was cut opened so precisely as to not harm the baby, another indication that this was a planned attack" Reid adds.

"We are looking for unsubs that have suffered a loss in their life, it is possible that this a married couple that lost their own baby or is unable to conceive so the female unsub was able to convince her partner that stealing one was the only option, one of the partners in this relationship could be a nurse or even a medical student studying to become one" I add after him.

"This is a kidnapping case so we need to be quick with finding this baby, what we can hope is that because these unsubs went through all the trouble to take the baby that they won't harm him and that he is being well taken care of" Morgan says.

"Right now we need to be patrolling the area of the scene of the crime and also even checking local hospitals to see if anyone had come in needed medical assistance for a newborn, while we know it was a controlled procedure if anything started to go wrong this person would care enough to risk getting caught to ensure this baby stays alive" JJ adds.

"We will give any new information we find as we get it ourselves, any questions?" Rossi asks as he finishes. We walk into Garcia's office where she is typing away going through all hospital records from this day, trying to find someone who may have brought in a new born baby.

"Garcia, I need you to look up possible medical students and or practicing nurses who work in the area where Mary was attacked" Reid asks her.

"That doesn't really narrow it down, there are a lot of practicing medical students around the area" She replies as her eyes scan over the list that goes on and on.

"We profiled that the female is the dominate one in the relationship so narrow it down to just woman" Reid adds.

"Checking, that still doesn't bring it down much" Garcia continues to look through the names that appear on her screen.

"Check for woman that have lost a child in the past year" Hotch says. Garcia types away and finally a shorter list of names comes up.

"This does help narrow it down, there is still a tragically longer list of names than I would like to see of mothers who lost their children but I can work with this to help find our unsub"

"Garcia I need you to go through the records of all those woman and find any that work near this area and would have had anything overlap with Mary Gibson to where she would be the object of the unsub's obsession with getting a child"

"Will do sir" Hotch leaves the room and Reid and I follow behind. We walk back into the briefing room and go through what we have trying to find this unsub.

I am focusing on the files in front of me and can feel the headache coming on, Reid sets down a cup of coffee in front of me and I smile up at him. "Thank you"

"No problem" He smiles back at me and then sits back down. Garcia rushes in ready to pull up something on the screen.

"I think I have found one of our unsubs" She turns on the monitor and pulls up a picture of a woman's driver licence. "This is Carla Thomson a 36 year old woman who is not only a practicing nurse but she also unfortunately the mother of a stillborn child, William"

"What about her do you think makes her our unsub?" Hotch asks.

"That's what I was getting too. William, her baby that I mentioned, he died one year to this day"

"We found the reason why it had to be today that she abducted Mary's baby, she must have felt that his birthday was symbolic and she needed to get a baby the exact same day to make the replacement even more real to her. She has worked so hard to convince herself that he is her child and by having his born on the exact same day will convince her he is the perfect replacement" JJ says.

"The husband must be the other unsub" Morgan suggests.

"And that's what brings me to something else, she has never been married. I didn't let that stop me so I went back to William's birth certificate and found out the father's name, the most logical answer would be that the male unsub is the father of William and that is when I came across another death certificate" She pulls up a death certificate for a man by the name of Adam Wilson, he committed suicide a couple of weeks ago"

"And there is the stresser" Prentiss says.

"If she isn't working with the father then who could be the other unsub?" Rossi asks.

"That's what I was looking for, what I found could potentially lead you to who could be the unsub. I did find a post from facebook that was posted on Carla's page that was a condolence from a page dedicated to a support group for people who are dealing with grief. It is called Hopeful Hearts and they meet every Sunday"

"We don't have time to wait for Sunday to come around, she could be gone with the baby by then. Are you sure she is apart of this group?" Hotch asks her.

"This isn't the first time she has interacted with that page. I felt icky about doing it but I already went through all the followers of that page and looked through the records to find any recent deaths in their family and I can confirm 14 and out of the 14 people 5 of them are men so there is a possibility that one of these men is your other unsub"

"Great job Garcia, forward the addresses to all of our phones" Hotch walks out in a hurry and the team follows behind him.

"Good job baby girl" Morgan tells her as he walks out of the room.

"Find that baby for that family" Garcia says, I go over to her and give her a hug.

"Don't worry" I follow the rest of the team out, I check my watch and see that five hours have passed since we first interviewed Mary at the hospital, that may be a big head start for the unsubs but we still have time for the odds to be in our favor.

I wait in the car as Hotch and Morgan go up to the third house, it feels wrong invading people's personal lives but there is a baby who was kidnapped and there is no time to wait. Reid is in the car with me and we sit in a silence that only I can manage right now, the first two men checked out and were clearly innocent, just confused how they got wrapped up in a FBI investigation. I hear Reid's phone buzzing and he sets it to speakerphone and answers it. "Garcia you are on speakerphone"

"Reid I have vital information, where is the team?"

"Hotch and Morgan are finishing interviewing the third person on the list, Jacob Nelson, we don't think it's him though, and Izzy is here with me. JJ, Rossi, and Prentiss are interviewing their half of the list right now" Hotch and Morgan walk out of the house and make their way back to the car as Reid answers Garcia. They are opening the door when Garcia begins talking again.

"Well get them on the line because this is urgent"

"Garcia?" Hotch asks as he gets into the car.

"What is it baby girl?"

"Have any of you already visited the residence of Louis Wright?" She asks us.

"We haven't, I'll call JJ and see if they have" I say as I pull out my phone and dial her number, it picks up almost instantly.

"Izzy" JJ says from the other line.

"Have you guys already visited a Louis Wright's house?"

"Actually he is next person on our house" She says from over the line. "Is there something going on?"

"I think so, Garcia is on the other line I am going to put you on speaker, get the rest of them"

"Are you guys ready?" Garcia asks.

"Yes, we are all here" Hotch says and Prentiss confirms on her end of my phone.

"Okay, so something was bothering me about Carla attacking Mary outside of the doctors office, Carla lives a few towns away and that is where she works, she works at an office near where she lives so it was weird to me that she went out of her way to attack Mary so far away so I looked into her work history and found out that she had just gotten transferred to the exact office where Mary visits just a few weeks ago. That would have to have been when the the obsession with Mary and her baby began. She had easy access to see her everyday and the reason I am calling is because the only person on that list that I gave you to be in close proximity to that doctors office was a Mr. Louis Wright. Louis works at a hardware store just a few blocks from where Mary was attacked and lost his wife to a car accident a few months earlier"

"So it was the perfect dynamic, Carla lost a spouse and a child and Louis lost his spouse, she must have convinced him they could be together if he did this for her. She found a solution to put her family back together by convincing him this was what he needed to do for her" Reid says.

"Garcia, why was Carla transferred offices?"

"There is no official reason listed but my best guess is that she moved in with Louis, she put her house up for sale just a couple of weeks ago"

"The final piece, she needed to get rid of the reminder of all she lost and start again. Do you think she would be there?" Morgan asks.

"We have to hope so, Prentiss, JJ, and Rossi I need you to meet us at Wright's house" Hotch says.

"Were on our way" JJ says before hanging up the phone, Hotch buckles up and speeds away heading into the direction of our unsubs.

Hotch pulls into the driveway of Louis Wright's house and I can hear the car with the rest of our team in it screech to a stop behind us. I open my side of the door with my gun ready in hand, anything could happen with a kidnapping situation, especially with a a woman we profiled to be under delusions. I step out of the car and am surrounded by my team, Hotch and Morgan go to the door first and have their weapons down by their side as not to startle one of the unsubs. I stand back by Reid and JJ and Rossi and Prentiss don't stand too far from us. A man with dark brown hair who is tall and clearly looks exhausted, his dark brown eyes have dark brown bags underneath them. There is a mix of shock and utter defeat in his eyes, he knows it must be over. "Louis Wright, I am Arron Hotchner with the FBI we need to know where Carla and the baby are" I silently beg him not to run, things are always harder when they decide to run.

"I don't know what you are talk about" He says but his voice is shaky, he isn't going to give up easily.

"Louis if you cooperate things will be so much easier for you, we just need to find Carla and the baby" Morgan calmly says to him, and this is when he decides to run. Morgan and Hotch chase after him and the rest of us go around the back of the house to try and corner him. We run through the back door and I already see that Morgan had taken him down and is putting handcuffs on him. I look around the house and see how bare it looks, there is just a couch in the middle of the room with a TV against the wall. I look around at the walls and don't find any pictures, for anyone who is dealing with the loss of someone they tend to build a shrine to them, leaving everything exactly how it was. Leaving the moment stuck in time to the last time their loved one was there. I walk into another room and see the exact opposite of what I saw out there, the room is painted a light blue and a crib sits in the center of the room, a chair in the corner with a teddy bare sitting in it. I look at the walls and see that directly over the crib is a picture of Carla holding a baby in her hand at a hospital. She is smiling in the picture but her eyes are red and puffy, tear stained as she clutches the baby who is already gone in her arms. Standing next to her is a man who is clearly not Louis, he is the father of William. Having the parents of a stillborn child bond with them is something that doctors always encourage, it's a way for them to understand and process their grief easier, something that obviously didn't help our unsub. Spelled out on the wall is the name William in baby blue foam letters, she had been planning to take him home here, this was supposed to be his room. Reid comes in and stops when he sees the room, he is as surprised as I am.

"The baby isn't here, neither is Carla. We are going to take Louis in for questioning" I nod my head at what he just said and I hear JJ calling from the other room.

"Guys, I found something" She calls out. Reid and I follow the sound of her voice out into the garage where there is a stack of picture frames and piles of clothes. "It looks like this is where all traces of Louis' wife are right here"

"Carla must have made him get rid of everything that reminded her of his wife, wanting him to encourage her fantasy of having her family being put back together" Reid says.

"Being reminded that he once had a wife before her made things less real for her, in her delusion she is the only woman in his life and he is super committed to raising a child with her" Rossi says as he walks into the garage. I walk back into the house and watch as Morgan walks Louis out in handcuffs, we need to get any information we can if we have any hope of locating that baby.

I stand behind the one way glass and watch as Hotch and Prentiss try and get anywhere will Louis, he hasn't requested council yet but he hasn't really said much, it's like he wants to tell us what he knows but he can't, he is so depressed and was taken advantage of that during the worst time of his life and now he feels like he owes everything to her. I watch his reaction to when Prentiss talks to her, we thought by putting a woman in there it would rattle him, Carla is clearly the dominate one in the relationship and by having a woman question him he probably would be more willing to give up information to her. Reid comes to stand next to me and is watching intently as everything is unfolding. "Has he given anything up yet?" He asks me.

"No, he keeps avoiding questions" I reply to him.

"We have patrol cars outside of his house in case she goes back there, we also have a car located at her house in case she decides to go back there"

"I don't know where else she would go, I mean she made him get rid of everything that was his deceased wife's and set up a room for this child they stole. I mean I want kids but I wouldn't ever dream of stealing a child from it's mother, actually cutting out the baby out of her"

"You want kids?" He asks me.

"Yeah, do you?"

"Yeah"

"That's good to know" I give him a small smile and he returns the smile to me. Prentiss and Hotch walks out of the room and comes out to talk with us.

"Izzy I want you and JJ to give it a go, I think he might respond better to two woman"

"Yes sir" I go into the interrogation room with JJ and sit across from Louis, he refuses to make eye contact with us. "Hi Lious, I'm detective Santiago and this is detective Jareau. We just want to know where Carla and the baby are"

"William" He whispers under his breath.

"William, is that the name of the baby?" JJ asks him.

"Our baby, he's our baby" She has convinced him that he is their son.

"Your's and Carla's baby?" JJ asks him, at the sound of her name he tenses up and stops talking.

"We know you know Carla, we know what she made you do" I tell him.

"I don't know what you are talking about" He replies, he's retreated back to acting like he doesn't know anything about her.

"We found your bloody clothes at your house, we've tested the blood on the clothes and it matches Mary Gibson's" JJ tells him.

"Why are you protecting her Louis? She made you hurt that innocent woman, she made you steal her baby. I know that it wasn't your idea, just like it wasn't your idea to get rid of all your wife's belongings" I say to him. This really sets him off, I can see something ignite in his eyes.

"I didn't get rid of anything, all of Lauren's stuff in just in the garage" He yells, we have stuck a nerve.

"Why is it fair that you had to put all her stuff in the garage? I mean in the room you two were going to raise your son in she put up a picture of her with her ex, the father of their son William" I say to him.

"William is our son!" He yells, he is very angry and gets louder after every word I say.

"No William is not your son, William is the name of Carla's son who died, he was her baby with someone else. And that baby isn't even her's or your's, his name isn't even William. She made you give up everything only to benefit her. What did she do? You two met in your support group and you started dating and she convinced you that to make both of you happy you needed to take a baby, you got a new wife out of it and she got the baby"

"You don't know her!" He is screaming and standing up now, I am standing up and getting closer to him as I talk. I remain clam but am vibrating from anger.

"I do know her, she is a manipulative woman who deliberately set you up to take the fall for her crime. She made sure you were the one who cut open that woman, she walked you through the process specifically so you could take the blame when we came for you. She probably told you that it had to be you to do it because she wasn't strong enough but you always knew deep down that she was just going to take that baby and run. She made you change your entire house and your entire life just so she could turn around and put up a framed photo of the man she really loves on your wall in the room that was supposed to be for your son. She ran the first chance she had so you could take the fall and she would get to keep the baby and you go to jail"

"She did not leave! She is waiting for me at the hotel we planned to meet at, right by the house" He is breathless and realizes what he has just said, he has finally given it up and while there is the look of regret in his eyes he looks a little relieved, he is finally free. JJ and I walk out of the room and we find Hotch and Morgan and Reid watching.

"We've got them" JJ says to Hotch, she then turns to me and smiles. "You did really good in there"

"Thank you" I follow the rest of the team as we go back to the car as Garcia sends us the address to the nearest hotel to Louis' house. The sirens from the car are blaring as we race to the hotel. Hotch pulls into the parking lot and we all jump out of the car, this arrest has to be very discreet, this is a public place and we need to remain calm so that we don't disturb any of the guests. We walk up to the front desk and Prentiss pulls out a picture of Carla and shows it to the woman working here.

"Have you seen this woman?" Prentiss asks. The woman looks hesitant to answer, Prentiss pulls out her FBI badge and the rest of us do the same.

"She checked in this morning"

"Was there a baby with her?"

"Yes, she checked in with her baby. She's in room 305" Prentiss thank's her and we all rush up the stairs to the third floor. We find room 305 and stand outside of the door, Hotch knocks on the door and wait for a response. We hear the door unlock and she opens up the door.

"Louis" She says and looks hopeful, it's when she sees that it is actually the FBI that she runs, she tries to close the door behind her but JJ won't let her and pushes it back open. The hotel room isn't very big and there isn't anywhere to go. She stands against the window holding the baby in her hands. He is small and screaming but he is alive and looks healthy, he may haven't had a smooth time coming into this world but at least he looks taken care of. Sometimes that's the only silver lining to these kinds of cases is that the unsub is going to take care of who she kidnapped.

"Carla I need you to hand the baby over to us, it's over" Morgan tells her.

"I won't let you take my son" She says as she holds him close to her.

"He isn't your son, I am so sorry what happened to your son but his mother needs him back" Prentiss tells her.

"You don't want take away someone else's baby the way yours got taken away" I tell her.

"I didn't take him, he belongs to me. I was supposed to be happy with him, I am a good mother" She is crying now as she looks down at him. "He is my baby"

"I know you've lost so much, with loosing William and then William's father but stealing someone else's child, taking their happiness isn't going to help you get any of your back"

"He lied to me, after William he told me we still had each other and then he went and killed himself, leaving me to be alone" She is crying harder and harder every single word she says. I get closer to her as she talks, JJ follows close behind and Prentiss goes on the other side of her.

"I just need you to hand him over to me, I will make sure nothing happens to him" She keeps crying and I reach out to take the baby into my hands, I take him and step away as JJ handcuffs her. They are leading her out when she stops by me holding the baby.

"I took such good care of him" She sobs.

"I know" I tell her as I clutch the baby close to me. I look down at him and feel his forehead, he is a little warm but other than that he seems to be fine. Reid comes up to me and places his hand on my back.

"They have called an ambulance" Reid tells me.

"Is it okay if I ride with him to the hospital?" I ask Hotch.

"That's fine"

"I'll go with her" Reid tells him and Hotch nods his head.

"We're notifying the family now" JJ tells me and the looks down at the baby and reaches down to stroke his face.

"Does he look okay? I haven't seen a baby since my sister was born and I was only five years old, I don't know how they are supposed to look like" I tell her.

"He looks pretty good under the circumstances, I'm sure he will be fine" JJ smiles at me and we walk out of the hotel room with Reid following behind. We walk down the stairs and there is an ambulance waiting outside. I walk up and get inside with Reid following behind, we both climb in and JJ tells us she will be meeting us at the hospital. I sit down and hand the baby over to the EMT's and watch them as they wrap him in a foil blanket and start examining him. Reid takes my hand and I smile at him, it's nice to have him here for comfort. The EMT hands me the baby back.

"You need to keep him warm, hold him close to you so that his body temperature can remain normal" I nod my head and hold him close to me as we race to the hospital.

"It's okay Luke" I say as he begins to cry. I shush him and try and calm him down as we get closer and closer to the hospital.

I look through the window as I watch Mary be reunited with her son, she is crying heavily and giving him small kisses as her husband takes her hand in his, a family being reunited. I walk out of the hospital and get back into the car, JJ is driving and I sit in the passenger seat, we both wanted to be here to make sure Luke was alright. "I can't wait to get home and see my boys, cases like these make me just want to go home and hold Henry and Micheal and never let them go" She says as she pulls out of the parking lot.

"It must be hard sometimes, having kids and seeing these cases day after day" I tell her.

"It can be, but it also motivates me to want to work even harder. I love my sons and would never trade them for anything. You were really good today with that baby, do you want kids?" She asks me.

"Yeah, I've always wanted kids"

"Well you would make a great mom"

"Thank you"

"You know Spencer really likes you" I can feel a blush creeping up.

"Really? You think so?" JJ is one of the closest people to him, I know how well she knows him.

"I can see it, his whole demeanor. I can see the way he lights up around you, I haven't seen him act like this before" I don't know what to say, I have so many thoughts running through my head. "He would make a great father" She jokes with me, I laugh.

"We haven't even gone on a single date, and besides I don't really think he was planning on asking me out anytime soon"

"Is it because he is a little awkward sometimes, you will get used to that but don't worry he likes you"

"It's not that, I actually think that is pretty cute. I'm just worried I'm not smart enough for him, that he won't find me very interesting because I am not on the same intellectual level as him"

"I have known Spencer for a very long time and I know that isn't a deal breaker, he may be a genius but he has a big heart and when he cares about someone he cares very deeply"

"Thank you JJ"

"You welcome, and he's the godfather to both of my children and Morgan's son and he is very good with children" I laugh.

"I'll remember that" I see her smile and I look and see that were almost back to the FBI.

 **Reid's POV**

I feel my palms begin to sweat and I rub them against my pants, I get up from my desk and go over to Izzy's desk where she is sitting. She looks up at me with her big brown eyes and brushes a strand of her hair out of her face. "Hi Spencer"

"Hi Izzy" I smile at her and she returns the smile.

"You did really good today" I tell her.

"Thank you, you did too"

"You were really good with that baby"

"Thanks" She smiles. I need to keep the conversation going, I need to think about anything to keep talking to her.

"So you have a sister?" I ask her.

"I do, her name is Lola. How did you know that?"

"You mentioned it earlier"

"Wow, and you remembered?"

"I have an eidetic memory so I couldn't really forget" She begins to laugh, she must think that I am funny.

"Well that gives you an unfair advantage in getting to know each other" She says. "Tell me something about you and I promise you I will remember it. Do you have any siblings?"

"No, I'm an old child. Do you only have the one sister?"

"Yes, she is five years younger than me" I know it's impolite to ask a woman her age so I decide not too. "I'm 29"

"I'm 35" I tell her.

"It's almost my birthday and I'll be 30, so I'm really not that much younger than you" She laughs.

"When is your birthday?" I ask her, I know that I can't forget things but I know her birthday is something that's important, something I need to remember.

"March 21st, when's yours?"

"October 28th"

"That's really close to Halloween"

"I love Halloween, It's my favorite holiday" I can feel the excitement inside of me, Halloween is something that I could talk about non stop and it isn't hard considering I know a lot about it.

"I like Halloween too" We have found something that we mutually agree on, here is my chance to go for it.

"Do you want to get dinner? With me? We could go right now or if you didn't want to we could go a different time" I am talking a lot, I want to stop talking but I can't make myself stop.

"Dinner sounds great, we can now"

"Okay, great" I asked her out and she said yes, I can feel that same excitement in me again and my heart is beating fast.

"Where do you want to go?" She asks me as she puts her coat on.

"I actually don't know very many places around here so you can pick" I try and rack my brain and then think of a nice Chinese place that I think she would like.

"Do you like Chinese food?"

"Yeah, that sounds great right now" She smiles at me and we begin walking out of the building and start walking down the street.

"So did you move here recently?" I ask her, I know that she mentioned she didn't know many places around here, maybe she moved recently.

"Yeah, I was originally from California but moved to Virginia to take a job working in sex crimes and then moved closer to begin working at the FBI. What about you?"

"I'm from Vegas, I grew up there with my mom before moving here to join the FBI"

"Wow, that's crazy that we both moved from the same region to end up meeting all the way across the country"

"I'm glad we did" I tell her.

"Me too" We get to the restaurant and I open the door for her, we wait for a table and I keep sneaking glances as her. When we get seated and are ordering when I try and think about something else to say to her, I could talk to her for hours. I watch her looking over the menu and I try and seem less creepy than just staring at her. "You okay?" She asks me.

"Oh yeah, I'm just a little nervous that's all"

"Don't be nervous, I don't usually bite" She laughs and I crack a smile.

"That's reassuring, it's just I haven't been on a date in a very long time"

"Neither have I" She tells me and it surprises me, it must show on my face because she gives me a questioning look. "What?"

"It's just hard to believe that you haven't been on a date recently, I mean your so beautiful"

"Thank you, but since my last boyfriend I haven't really dated anyone" I can see the sadness on her face when she talks about her boyfriend, something must have happened.

"My last girlfriend, her name was Maeve, she was murdered by an unsub we were tracking. I only met her in person once" She gets quiet after I say that and I know I've said the wrong thing, I've shared way too much way too soon. "I'm sorry"

"No, it's okay. My last boyfriend, his name was Tony. He was my boyfriend through our last few years or high school and then the firs two when we were in college, we actually were engaged for a little while, but anyway he was a really great guy but he had a vice, he was a heroin addict and died of an overdose. After he died I moved to Virginia to start over" It's now my turn to get quiet, not only was she engaged but she dated a guy with a drug problem. I remember when Maeve didn't tell me about having a fiancee, it was hard but we had been dating for so long and she never told me, at least Izzy was upfront about this. Her telling me that he had a drug problem, I haven't used in years but not telling her could only hurt any relationship we may have.

"I want you to know that I really care about you and I'm telling you this because I don't want to hide anything from you, years ago I was kidnapped by an unsub named Tobias Hankel, he tortured me and injected me with a drug called dilaudid, when I got away and killed him I became addicted to it for a little while, I haven't used any in a very long time I can promise you that but if it's too much because of what happened with Tony I understand" She pauses and then takes my hand.

"I am so sorry, it was hard what I went through but I know you aren't some druggie, it was hard what I went through with Tony and for a really long time I just ignored it because I loved him and that's something I will never forgive myself for but I know you are a good person and I really like you too, and I'm so happy you told me. You can tell me anything and I'm so sorry about Maeve" I squeeze her hand and feel really happy to be here with her, I've told her some of the hardest thing's in my life and she didn't shy away, she's still here. The waiter comes over to take our order and I notice that she is still holding my hand.

I walk her all the way to her apartment, we have been talking non stop since we sat down, it was so easy for us to smooth the conversation back and get into getting to know each other better without having to fish the depths of each others souls, we've only known each other for almost a month but being with her makes me feel like a brand new person without having to change much about myself, she likes me for who I am. It's always been hard to talk to beautiful woman but she doesn't shy away, she sometimes seems like I make her nervous, something I didn't think was possible. I stop at her door and know that I want to kiss her, I never got to kiss Maeve and I know that I'm not going to let a chance like that to slip through my fingers again. "I had a really nice time, thank you for inviting me to dinner"

"Thank you for coming" I tell her, she is looking up at me when I feel her take her hand and wrap it around the back of my neck and she gets up on her tip toes to meet my lips halfway. Her lips are warm and still taste a little sugary from the desert we ate. She moves her lips underneath mine and I'm kissing her back. She pulls back and has a huge smile on her face.

"I'm sorry"

"Don't apologize, it was very nice" I say to her. "If you hadn't kissed me I probably would have kissed you first" I add.

"I really want to do this again" She tells me.

"Me too"

"I'll see you tomorrow, and I will call you because I know that you don't really like texting"

"That is correct, I prefer talking on the phone, that way there is no mixed communication between people if they are actually talking on the phone"

"That is very true" She says. I lean down and kiss her quickly and can feel her smiling.

"I'll see you tomorrow" She unlocks her apartment and goes inside, giving me one more quick smile before she closes the door behind her. I walk down the steps and out of her building, I pull my scarf around my neck a little tighter waiting for the December cold to hit me but don't feel it, I can still feel the warmth of Izzy's lips against mine and can feel the way my heart is beating against my ribs, still feeling the joy of the night I just spent with Izzy, a night like this I hope to have more of.


	3. Hope

**Izzy's POV**

I walk into the bureau and try and act normal and not like I spent half the night on the phone talking to Reid. Ever since our first date a few weeks ago we have gone on a few more dates and have spent countless hours talking on the phone. Including last night, I don't think either of us got much sleep last night but it was worth it, just talking to him always makes me incredibly happy and it seems like there is always something for us to say to each other. Initially I was worried that because he is so much smarter than me that our conversation would be lacking, that I wouldn't be able to keep up with him or hold his same intellect, that it was only a physical attraction that we feel for each other but it's so much more. I walk to my desk and take off my coat and set it on the back on my chair, I have Reid's purple scarf that he wrapped around me a few nights ago as we were leaving a restaurant still around my neck and I realize that everyone will recognize it. We haven't told anyone and for obvious reasons, it's a delicate subject to be dating someone from work, much less working in the FBI and dating someone on my team. Eventually we will have to disclose our relationship to Hotch, it is inevitable and we will cross that bridge when we get there and face whatever comes from it but for now it is nice that it's just the two of us. I take the scarf off and remember the way it felt when he wrapped it around me, kissing my cheek as he did, that huge smile he had on his face afterwords. I set the scarf down on his desk and hope he was here early enough today that no one actually saw his come in without a scarf on. I see his bag on the floor and know that he is already here, I look around and don't see him, I decide I am going to need some coffee so I go over to get some. I wait for the coffee to brew when I feel a gentle hand wrap around my waist and touch my back, I turn and see Reid's brown eyes staring back at me. "Hi"

"Hi" I say back to him, as soon as his touch was there it is gone and even though I know were at work I still miss it. The coffee is gone and I pour myself a cup and then pour him one in his mug.

"Did you sleep alright?" He asks me, I subconsciously touch my eyes and hope that there isn't any bags under my eyes.

"Yeah, does it look like I didn't?" I ask because I am comfortable enough around him at this point, and because I know that he wouldn't lie to me.

"No, of course not. You look beautiful. You just sounded really sleepy last night" I feel a blush at his comment on me being beautiful.

"Sorry, I guess I was just a little tired from the case"

"Don't be sorry, I just hope that I didn't keep you up"

"Oh no not at all, besides I will always stay up to talk to you" I smile at him and wish I could just kiss him right now. His hair is a little messy and I take a step closer to fix it for him, he takes a sip of coffee and lets me run my fingers through his hair as I try and tame his curls. I hear the sound of someone clearing their throat and I notice Morgan standing there watching the two of us. I immediately take a step back and I watch as Reid fumbles and is trying not to spill his coffee. Shit. I look at Morgan who has a smirk on his face, he clearly saw something and thinks it's humorous that he caught us so off guard.

"Garcia has a case for us, I volunteered to go find you guys" He is trying to sound casual and trying not to laugh as he talks to us.

"Okay, I'll be right there" I tell him and set down my cup of coffee, I look at Reid one more time and then walk past Morgan and up the stairs into the room, Prentiss and JJ are already sitting in their usual spots and Hotch and Rossi follow behind me. I sit down and soon Morgan and Reid come into the room, Morgan is talking to Reid about something and then takes his shoulders as he finishes, he looks over at me and winks and I can definitely tell that he knows something. Reid sits down next to me and it takes everything I have not too turn to him and ask him what that was all about.

"Welcome my family" Garcia says as she stands in front of the screen with the remote already in hand. "Last week in San Francisco Cali there was a car accident involving a man named Justin Griffin and a couple named Abigail and Robert Taylor, Justin hit their car as it was stopped in the middle of the road and he was unable to stop in time, Justin needed to go to the hospital but made it out with only a concussion. Abigail and Robert weren't so lucky, they were pronounced dead on scene, it was during a routine autopsy when there was some red flags, for starts both of them had been dead for as long as a day before the car accident even occurred. Abigail was also sexually assaulted before her death, we were contacted about this because less than a month ago another car accident with some eerily similar details to the accident that just happened. The accident involved another couple by the names of Allison Sanchez and Michael Young, they weren't married but were engaged and again were dead on the scene. Due to the severity of the accident where Alison went through the windshield it wasn't a big investigation into the death's, the man who hit them was drunk and he ended up spending some time in jail so no harm no fowl. The reason they began to look into this now was because they initially found semen on the dress she was wearing and they assumed that they had sex in the car and that's why she didn't have her seat belt on when the car was hit, after looking into the recent accident they tested the collected DNA found on her and it did not match her fiancee so they believe it is the same unsub"

"So the unsub is killing these people and using car accidents to mask the murders by making them look like car accidents" JJ says.

"We need to get there, grab your go bags. Wheels up in 30" Hotch walks out of the room and everyone starts to stand up but I feel trapped in my seat.

 _I look over at her and smile, the rain is pouring lightly on the windshield of the car and I crack the window slightly not wanting to get wet but feeling suffocated in the hot car. The sun is starting to set but of course in California there is always enough light to go around. Mom is focused on the road and it's nice just to be alone with her, I've always enjoyed our mother daughter time, especially since I will be going off to college soon. I start to speak to her in Spanish, her native language. My dad has learned how to speak it over the years of being married to her but he's never been able to keep up with her, maybe that's why they finally called it quits. Being alone with her it's easy to communicate without having to wait for my dad to keep up, something that's always been hard for him. She begins to respond when there is a loud crash, one of the loudest sounds I've heard up close. I feel the seat belt tighten around me and the white cloud of the air bag explodes and I can feel it around my face. I try and look to where my mom is and I can now see that her side is crushed, the other car directly hit her. I see her body crumple and I start to scream for help, for anyone to save her. I am still screaming when the ambulance arrives, by the time they tell me she's gone my voice is horse and my body is numb. The rain keeps falling around me, the world keeps on spinning even though part of mine is now gone._

"Izzy?" Reid's voice pulls me out of the memory, I look around and see that the room is empty except for the two of us. I touch my face to make sure I'm not crying and I stand up. "Are you okay?"He looks worried.

"Yeah, I'm fine" I lie, I haven't told him yet and I don't want him to find out this way. Seeing me breaking down over a case.

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, I haven't been sitting here for long right?"

"No, they just all walked out" His voice sounds cautious, he knows that something is up.

"Okay, I'll grab my bag and then we can get onto the jet" I tell him. He keeps looking at me and I check around the room to make sure no one is looking when I lean up and kiss him quickly. "I've wanted to do that all morning" He is smiling and then takes my hand.

"You can tell me if anything is wrong, I am a really great listener, most people feel comfortable telling me about their problems and it wouldn't be anything different for you to talk to me" I nod my head and squeeze his hand.

"I know, I promise you if I need to talk to you I will" He accepts my response and I'm grateful that he understands and doesn't push it. We both walk out of the room and I go to my desk and grab my bag and put my coat on, I look down at my desk and see that the purple scarf is sitting there. I pick it up and look over at him, he sees me holding up his scarf and walks over to me. "What is this?"

"I let you borrow it for a reason, you can keep wearing it if you want"

"But won't everyone notice that it's your scarf"

"Maybe, but I don't care" He gives me a big smile and I swear I can feel my heart flutter. He wraps it around my neck and I can feel my smile spreading across my face. I wait for Reid to grab his bag and we meet Emily at the elevator, she notices my scarf and I see her smile.

"I like your scarf" She tells me.

"Thank you" I say.

"We should call Garcia later just to make sure she is okay, I know that these kinds of cases dealing with car accidents always brings down her mood" Prentiss tells the both of us. I suddenly remember that Garcia lost her parents to a car accident, losing my mom was hard enough but I couldn't imagine losing both at once. When I am finally ready to tell everyone I know that she will be the only one who can fully understand what I am going through. I know everyone will be there and I couldn't ask for a better group of people to be there for me but Penelope will be able to relate on a whole different level, I know Spencer will be there for me no matter what and will understand.

 **Reid's POV**

Izzy sits across from me and she is focusing on reading over the case files, when we land in California I'll go off with Morgan to talk with the medical examiner and she will go off with Prentiss to talk to the man who hit the car, I know that right now is the time to talk to her but I don't know how to bring it up. Just watching her space out like that was a little scary, she has definitely made me come out of my comfort zone but being with her just brings out that side out me. I missed out on so much with Maeve and I won't let that happen this time. It isn't fair of me to ever compare the two, Maeve will always share a special place in my heart and I will never be able to forget her or what she did for me but being with Izzy is so different and I just don't want her to feel like there isn't something she can share with me. Even before she came into my life everyone on the team has been able to tell me anything and I was able to listen, I just hope that whatever this is she will feel comfortable enough to tell me so I can help her in any way I can. I look at her staring intently over the case file and I notice that her lip is bleeding, I lean over the table between us and she looks up at me, I touch her lip and brush away the blood but it keeps bleeding. I stand up and wash my hands, I usually have a problem with germs but I try and calm myself as I rinse the soap from my hands. I bring her over a napkin so she can apply pressure and hopefully stop the bleeding. "Your lip is bleeding"

"Yeah, I guess I bit it too hard. It's just a nervous habit I've had for a while" She doesn't sound worried about it but I notice her still biting them, I've never seen her this nervous before.

"Okay" I don't really know what else to say. I give her a small smile and think about what Morgan said to me this morning, he knows about us and has for a while. He said that he was happy for us and when I asked him not to say anything he agreed, but he couldn't guarantee that everyone didn't already know, apparently there has been speculation about it for a while. I think back to Emily noticing my scarf around Izzy's neck, she is someone I know wouldn't say anything but I'm glad Morgan knows, he can be someone I can talk to about what is obviously going on with her right now and see if he noticed it too.

We go to the medical examiner and I wait for her to give me the medical report, I have been trying to think about the way that a murder could go unnoticed due to a car accident, there has to have been some indication that something wasn't right. Morgan stands next to me waiting for her to show up and I take advantage of this. "Do you think Izzy has been acting weird today?" I ask him.

"I don't think so" He replies quickly. "But I don't know her as well as you do obviously" He adds as he gives me a smirk.

"You can't say anything, she doesn't want anyone to know yet"

"I know, and don't worry about it, I got you" He is smiling but I trust him, I know that he really wouldn't say anything about it. "But I actually think you two are really good together, she's pretty perfect for you" I smile at the words he's saying, not that I actually need Morgan's approval but it's nice to know that he likes her.

"She is pretty amazing" I really could talk about her for hours, there is just something about her that is so unique, she manages to be funny, smart, understanding and a bad ass all at the same time. The medical examiner walks in and apologizes for the delay.

"There was a harder time getting the initial reports on the deaths of the first couple from a month ago"

"No problem" Morgan tells her as she hands him the reports. Morgan hands them over to me and I begin to look them over, reading at a speed most people can't even understand. I finish all four of them in under a minute and begin to examine the bodies.

"As you can see the cause of death is due to strangulation, there are faint marks still on the necks of the first couple and we initially believed those marks were when the seat belt pulled against them when the car was hit but due to also finding them on Allison's neck without her actually having her seat belt on when the car was hit" She tells us.

"Was the semen a match to anyone?" Morgan asks.

"No, we couldn't find a hit on the DNA so your guy must not have a record or his DNA just isn't in the system" She answers and I breathe out, I always hate it when we come to dead ends like this. We both thank her and then leave as we make our way to the police station to meet up with the rest of the team.

When we walk in Hotch is talking with one of the local cops and JJ and Rossi don't seem to be around, they must still be talking with the families of the victims. Izzy and Prentiss soon walk in and I see them and give both of them a smile, I know that I can talk to Emily and ask her how Izzy seemed during the interviews. When Izzy walks away to go talk to Hotch I take my chance and walk over to Prentiss as she is sitting down. "Hey Reid" She says to me and I give her a smile.

"Hi, how did your interview go?" I ask her.

"Better than expected, I mean this guy actually thought he killed two people, something like that is incredibly traumatizing. We were lucky that we were able to get so much out of him, he could have easily began to repress this and shut down but with his cognitive interview we can use the way the cars are abandoned and positioned to help us build the profile" She finishes. "What did you get from the M.E.?" She asks.

"Not as much as we had hoped for. All she could tell us was cause of death was strangulation and while there was semen left from both sexual assaults there wasn't a DNA match to anyone in the system" I tell her.

"Hopefully we will catch a lead soon, this whole case is strange and I think Izzy was getting that same vibe, she was pretty quiet the whole drive" She throws out there, she says it casually and I know that I can get more information about how she was acting.

"That's strange, it doesn't sound like she was acting like herself" When you can get Izzy going she can be very talkative, she has a bubbly side of her personality that loves to talk. There is also another side of her that can listen to me talk on and on and be actively engaged the entire time.

"No, it could just be because she is back in her home state in a really long time, I know that can always be hard on some people. The pressure of bringing a case so close to where you grew up" I nod my head, how could I have not seen it before. It must be because we are in California, I know that she grew up near L.A. but just being back in her home state yet still far away from her family must be hard on her. She doesn't talk about her family a whole lot, occasionally her sister is brought up and I remember our first case together when she told me her dad was a doctor and her mom was an immigrant from Mexico. That was all I was able to get out of her so far, maybe the focus has been too much on me and my family. She knows about my mom and her schizophrenia and how I haven't seen my dad in years and she was understanding, maybe I just have given her too much that she hasn't really had a chance to tell me much about her family. I decide that I am going to give her the chance to let her talk about her family to me, maybe that will make her feel a little better.

"Yeah, your probably right" I tell her. Prentiss looks at me and then puts her hand on my back.

"Don't worry about it too much, I'm sure she will be fine" She gives me a reassuring smile and I smile at her back. She may not officially know about us yet but she can tell that I care about her, I mean we all do. Over the past few months Izzy has become part of our family, and as a family we worry and look out for each other. Prentiss sees Izzy walking over here and she stands up to leave saying she needs to talk to Hotch. Izzy sits down next to me and smiles, it seems different from the way she smiled at me this morning as she was fixing my hair but seeing her smile makes me feel a little bit better. She is going to lift her hair up to put it into a pony tail when the sleeves on her long sleeve shirt moves up revealing a tattoo on her wrist. The word 'Hope' is inscribed in black ink. I never knew she had a tattoo, it wasn't exactly something that has come up before but I still don't know how one in such an obvious place like her wrist wouldn't have been noticed before. I think back to all the times we've been together and I know that it's been winter time so she has been mostly wearing sweaters and long sleeved shirts most of the time, come to think of it she is always wearing something to hide her arms. Maybe she just gets cold easily, she probably went thought a big change moving from the sunshine all the time to having all four seasons. I find it weird that she hasn't changed yet, she could have traded her long sleeved shirt for a short sleeved one on the ride here, it isn't super hot out but it is definitely a heat wave compared to the weather in Virginia right now. As her sleeve moves up I notice near the tattoo along her arm is small little scars that seem to be trying to be hidden by the tattoo, they are small horizontal lines along her arm. The scars are lighter against her tanned skin and I know instantly what they are, self harm marks.

"Hope" I say out loud, I don't really mean too but I am curious to what the tattoo means.

"What did you say?" She asks me, not in a mean tone but a questioning one as to where I got that word from. She must be worried that I've noticed her scars because she abandons trying to put her hair up and just lets it fall along her shoulders.

"Your tattoo" I say, I don't want her to feel self conscious of her scars of make her think that I have seen them and am judging her for them, I would never do that to her. When she is ready to tell me she will, I can't push her into admitting to me something that she isn't ready to share yet.

"Oh, Hope was my mom's name" She says in a soft voice, I notice her use of the past tense and know that her mom has probably died, and that is probably the reason she has been like this. This is probably the first time she has been back since her mom has died.

"I'm sorry" I tell her, I really don't know what more to say,

"It's okay, she died when I was 17" She tells me. I don't really know what to say to that, losing her mother so young must have been really hard for her, I want her to know I will be there for her and that she can tell me about it but I know this isn't the time or the place, this will just have to wait.

 **Izzy's POV**

I keep feeling myself pulling down my sleeves, Reid saw my tattoo which means he probably saw my scars too. I try not to show that I am absolutely freaking out over this. I always knew that eventually my team was going to find out, Hotch already knows because my depression and years of cutting were put into my file, I obviously have been cleared for work and haven't had any problems like that since I was 18 but now that I am in a relationship with Reid I knew that I was going to have to tell him first and give him an explanation as to why. It is never an easy thing to tell someone who hasn't been through it why, all you get is judgement. I never had this problem with Tony because we were dating while it was happening, we went through it together and he never once needed me to explain myself, he just wanted me to get better. I know I shouldn't even be freaking out this much, Reid has told me so much that anyone could have easily judged him for, he told me of times when he would use and he trusted me completely, why would it be so hard for me to do the same? Every time I look at them I hate it, I feel like I made a terrible mistake and wish I had never done it but I learned a long time ago that I can't keep living in the past and that I need to move forward. We all sit around the table looking at this impossible case, I remember times when there was easier cases working in sex crimes and they were only easier strictly because we had DNA, something we have but can't use. "So we have a killer that uses a car accident that he orchestrated to happen in order to cover up his crime" Morgan announces to us all, sometimes it is just easier to think out loud, especially when we don't have much to work with.

"But he contradicts himself by raping the woman and leaving DNA without any attempt to cover it up, he is trying to hide but also doesn't make any attempt to get rid of his DNA" Prentiss adds to the conversation.

"So there is obviously a sexual component to the killings with the evidence of sexual assault to the female victims and not for the males, but both killings have been in pairs so there is an obvious preference to the woman but that need to kill a couple" JJ says.

"It could have been opportunistic, he found a female he liked and knew he wouldn't be able to get them away so he just killed both" Morgan replies.

"There isn't a coincidence there, he wants to kill couples, maybe it is a way to make him feel powerful. He is able to overpower two people at once. Killing a couple would definitely be his signature, he can't stop himself, he has to kill in pairs" Rossi says.

"The posing the bodies in their cars is another thing he feels compelled to do, it is his way to get rid of his crime and completely throw us off track" Hotch throws out there.

"But I don't think it's only to get rid of the body, there is plenty of other ways he could have done that, there must be something that happened that has somehow connected him to a car accident" I say, this whole case has thrown me off a little but I am trying my best to stay on my game and catch this unsub.

"So you think that there is something involving a car accident that happened to him in his life that has fixated him on them?" Hotch asks me.

"I think so, maybe he was involved in one and it cost him a loved one possibly? I mean that might be why he kills in couples, he could have a survivor but his loved one didn't and he now is killing in pairs to prevent someone else that pain he felt" I tell everyone. I can see the way Reid is looking at me, it feels like his eyes are burning a hole through my head. He knows and I can no longer hide it, I feel so exposed all at once, like I'm standing in my underwear right in front of my entire team.

"So a form of a twisted mercy killing?" JJ asks.

"I guess, it could be that he has always had these urges to kill but maybe she had helped him resist, and when she was killed he was fixated on the idea that it was a car accident so that's how he has to dispose of the bodies. He rapes the woman because he might be angry with her for dying, he feels like she left him and maybe she is forcing him to have to kill because she is no longer with him?" I try, I still am not sure but I know that something happened.

"Well that could be a start, Morgan will you call Garcia and tell her to focus on finding any security footage for the area's where the cars that the accidents were involved in were left and have her look up car accidents around the area that has happened in the past two months to see if there was anyone injured while there was one death" Hotch tells Morgan. Morgan nods and pulls out his phone and puts it on speakerphone.

"Hey baby girl, you are on speaker so behave yourself" Morgan tells her through the phone.

"Hello peachy" Prentiss talks into the phone to her.

"Hey family, how is my home state?" She ask.

"Our home state is great, very sunny" I say to her.

"Ahh yes, my fellow Californian beauty" I feel a smile spread across my face.

"San Francisco is definitely dull without you mama" Morgan flirts with.

"I already know that but it's nice to hear it"

"We are going to need you to try and find some security footage from where both cars were found and we are looking into trying to see if maybe the unsub was involved in a car accident himself so look up for recent records of accidents reported in the area" Morgan tells her.

"Okay, I will be right on that" She replies.

"Thanks baby girl, you doing alright?" Morgan asks.

"Yeah, these cases are always hard, especially now when it is in my home state and home town but I'm doing good, thank you"

"You know we are here for you Penelope" JJ tells her.

"I am sending you all my love" She says and then hangs up the phone. I knew it before that they would always be there for me but just hearing how they are checking in on Garcia is very reassuring, I know that if I told them right now they would have nothing but love for me. I stand up and go over to get some water, I really need to step away and just take a minute. I hear footsteps behind me and assume it is Reid but when I turn around I see that it's Hotch.

"How are you?" He asks me, I really didn't expect this from him.

"I'm okay, it's hard but I just really want to focus on the case" I tell him.

"Well if you need to take a break or step back I understand, the team would too"

"I don't doubt that, I just don't really know how to tell them exactly"

"Well, whatever feels right you will know and you don't even have to tell them if you don't want too. But just know that they all care about you, we all do and will be here"

"Thank you"

"Anytime" I grab a water and then head back to the table and sit next to JJ and Prentiss, I can't get this case out of my head but I don't want this to consume me. I know I will feel better about this if I talked about it but I want the first person I tell to be Reid, he deserves to know first. I am about to join the conversation when Hotch comes in, something must have happened because he is looking alert and ready to go. "There was just another abandoned car found with two bodies in it, we are going to need everyone so we can interview people around to see if they saw anything" We all get up from the table and head out to the cars, I walk outside and feel the warmth shine down on me. I have missed this, I love my new home but leaving California was leaving a part of me behind, it was purposeful but I want Reid to know the whole me, I want my new family to know the whole me. I get into a car with Morgan, Prentiss, and Reid and Morgan speeds off following close behind the car Hotch is driving. We pull up and their is already yellow tape blocking off the crime scene, there is a car that is blocked off that has clearly been rear-ended by a car. I get out and have Morgan, Prentiss, and Reid following behind me, I walk right up to the car and see two dead bodies sitting in the front and passengers seat, I feel sick as soon as I walk up there and instantly regret it. I start to feel lightheaded and uncomfortable, I just want to leave. This is all too familiar to me, just looking at this lifeless woman sitting in this car makes me remember my mom, how she was there one second and then gone like that the next. I begin to back up and feel Reid's arms wrap around my back, he is supporting me and I don't even care that we are right here in front of everyone, I actually feel like I might not physically be able to keep myself standing up.

"Izzy, what is wrong?" He sounds worried, I know that I can't keep it together anymore, I am breaking, I feel like I am exploding. I feel like I can't even speak.

"I can't be here" I manage, there isn't even hesitation as he keeps holding onto me and goes over to Hotch.

"I need to get her out of here" Reid tells him, Hotch nods his head in understanding and Reid leads me over to one of the cars and he gets into the drivers side and I get into the passengers side. I am going through the motions of putting my seat belt on but don't feel like I am actually doing it. He drives off away from the crime scene, I don't pay attention to where we are going but eventually Reid stops the car and pulls over to the side. "I didn't think you wanted to go back to the station"

"Thank you" I tell him, with those two words I feel the tears begin to pour. I have been holding it all in and I just can't anymore, it's too much. He takes my hand and reaches over to pull me into a hug.

"You can tell me" He says softly, he is stroking my hair and doing everything he can to try and calm me down. I hold onto him for a little while longer and then pull away so I can face him when I tell him. I take a deep breath and try and control my emotions enough to get through this.

"When I was 17 years old I was in the car driving home with my mom from spending the day with her when a car came out of nowhere and hit our car. It was my mom's side that was impacted and she died instantly, I walked out of that accident with only some scratches and bruises and a concussion. I was with her when she died, I watched her die and there was nothing I could do" I feel my voice break as I speak those words. This has always been the hardest thing for me, the fact that I couldn't even do anything as my mom was dying. "I survived something that took my mom from me, it was incredibly difficult to know that I survived but she didn't. I had never been super close with my dad and once my parents split up it was really just mostly me and my mom and sister but once she was gone it was like a part of me died. I lived with my dad until I turned 18 when I went off to college and tried to do everything I could to distance myself from him. I changed my last name to my mom's maiden name and I really haven't talked to my dad since, I was so angry that my mom died thinking my father didn't love her anymore. Dealing with everything happening so suddenly wasn't good for me at all, I began cutting myself in order to deal with everything that was hurting. It was so much easier to deal with the physical pain, the pain I thought that I deserved because I survived and she didn't. I was in therapy and got the help that I needed, after Tony died and everything that happened I decided that I needed to get out of California and I haven't been back since, and now that I am here because of a case involving car accidents it is just is all so much" I stop and wait for him to say something, anything would be better than silence.

"I don't ever want you to think you deserve pain, ever, because you don't. You are one of the best people I have ever met and I am so sorry that happened to you, no one deserves that. You can tell me anything and I would never judge you, you are a good person and I wish I could take away your pain" I feel myself smile and I wrap my arms around his neck and pull him into a hug, I wish I could hold onto him and never let go.

"You are the sweetest person ever, do you know that?" I tell him and kiss him quickly.

"I wish you would have told me earlier, if this case is too much I know Hotch would understand if you stepped back" He tells me.

"Hotch already knows about everything, it is in my file because I used to harm myself I needed to be cleared before I could join sex crimes, obviously I was cleared, it was just a precautionary thing but when I got transferred to the BAU Hotch had the information. It is also in my file that I was in the car accident that killed my mom. I don't want this case to effect me like this, I want to help put this sicko away"

"If you aren't ready we will understand, no one would be upset"

"I know, but I need to do this for myself"

"Okay" He gives me a smile and starts the car and begins to drive off. "And since you have told me everything I want you to know that I like your tattoo"

"Thank you"

"It is really beautiful, I just didn't know you had a tattoo"

"I have a couple"

"Really?" He asks, he sounds surprised.

"Yeah, maybe I'll let you see the others sometime" I flirt with him. He seems at a loss for words so he clears his throat and then a smile forms across his face.

"I hope it is okay but I've seen your scars, they really aren't that bad" He is trying really hard right now, I know he is, and I appreciate it. I don't have a response to it and I can tell he is trying to calm me down, or at least keep the car without silence. "You know I think I know why you bite your lips, I know you said it was a bad habit but it probably is just your way of subconsciously hurting yourself in a way that is safer and not extreme, it is that familiarity and comfort of why you hurt yourself before, I noticed how you started doing it when we got the case, a time when you were stressed" Just hearing him being himself and trying to make sense of everything to him is oddly comforting. This is who he is and I wouldn't want anyone else. He drives back to the station and parks the car, I know that as soon as I walk in there everyone is going to have questions and I will have to be ready to have answers, that is something that I am ready for now. We get out of the car and before we walk into the building Reid kisses my cheek, I can still feel the warmth from his lips on my cheek even after they are gone and I look at him and smile. We walk in and Reid pulls Hotch aside, ready to catch up on what we have missed so we don't have to waste anymore time. I walk into the room and everyone looks up at me, there is a split second where there is this fear that there is judgment but all I see is worry in their eyes, worry for me.

"Hey girlie" Pretniss says to me, she walks up to me and pulls me into a hug. "How are you?" She asks.

"I'm doing better now" I smile and as soon as Prentiss pulls away from our hug JJ is there to wrap me into another hug.

"I'm glad Spencer was there with you" JJ whispers to me, I pull away and smile, silently telling her I am too. Morgan comes to hug me next and then Rossi.

"You don't have to tell us anything, we don't expect you to if you aren't comfortable yet" Rossi tells me.

"I don't want you guys not to know me. As you know I used to live in California and when I was 17 my mom was killed in a car accident, it was the hardest thing that I have ever gone through and being back here again and the case has just brought back all those old emotions and I'm really sorry I couldn't be more professional today" I tell them, as I talk I feel like a weight being lifted off of me.

"Don't apologize, you don't have anything to be sorry for" Pretniss tells me.

"We are glad you told us, and we are so sorry that happened to you" Rossi says.

"We all understand if it would be easier to not continue on the case for you, we just want you to be comfortable" JJ tells us. I can feel the warmth in her voice.

"I want to, I want to catch this unsub" I announce.

"Alright, let's get back to work" Rossi says as I sit down.

"What did you guys find at the crime scene?" I ask.

"It was definitely our unsub, except he is devolving, he left the car during the daylight and he has killed again in such a short amount of time when the time between his first and second kill was a month" Rossi says.

"It was the same MO, he had killed them by strangulation and there was sign of sexual assault on the woman" Morgan says.

"So what we do know about this unsub? He is a white male and if our vicimology means anything than the unsub is usually close in age with his victims so mid to late 20's, even early 30's are very possible" Prentiss says.

"And the killing of couples is something he needs to do, also place the bodies in the victims cars in order to make it look like car accidents" I say.

"But he thinks that he can't get caught, he leave DNA after the sexual assault, we couldn't find a match meaning he probably isn't in the system so he doesn't have a history of crime so whatever the stresser is has awaken this urge inside of him" Hotch says, he has just walked back into the room with Reid. "I think we have enough for a profile so hopefully Garcia has something for us"

"Why don't you guys go give the profile and I'll call her" I tell them, they all nod and as they are leaving the room Reid comes over and brushes his hand against my shoulders and plants a small kiss on the top of my head.

"I'm proud of you" He whispers and then walks out of the room to join the rest of the team. I take out my phone and dial Garcia's number, she picks up after the first ring.

"Hey Iz"

"Hey Garcia, did you find anything on those traffic cams?"

"Yes, well sort of. There was a person who clearly was leaving the car after posing the bodies, it was really sick to watch"

"Was there anything identifiable about the unsub in the video?" I ask her.

"No, but I did look into all our victims and what they had paid for last and both sets of our victims had visited a local restaurant so that is probably where our unsub met his victims"

"Garcia you are amazing, thank you"

"Honey, we are both amazing" She replies back to me. "How are you?" She asks.

"I'm good" I answer, I can tell from her tone of voice that she heard something was going on with me. Since I have joined the team I have gotten pretty close to everyone and it was easy to get to know Garcia, she is one of the sweetest people I have ever met and I know that it will be easy to talk to her, especially about something that is so close to both of us.

"I don't mean to pry, I had just called Morgan earlier and I asked where you and Reid were and he said you guys needed to take a step back, I hope that it's okay that I'm asking I just wanted to make sure you are alright"

"Yeah, I am. This case has just brought back a lot of old memories for me, my mom died in a car accident when I was 17" I feel the words spill out of me. That is a phrase I haven't said much in the past ten years and yet I feel like I've said it about ten times today.

"Aww Iz, I'm so sorry"

"It's okay" I reply, I know I have said that at least ten times today.

"No it's not, trust me I know because my parents died in a car accident when I was young too, in that same city you guys are in right now. I have said that same phrase so many times but I always know deep down it's not okay. It gets better, especially when you have a kick ass family to be there with you like we do, but it is never okay"

"I know" I can feel the tears falling as I say those two words. I promised myself that I wouldn't cry anymore today but I couldn't hold it in, she knows exactly how I feel and it's nice for it be someone other than my sister, the only other person who knows what it was like to lose our mom.

"Well I really hope you are okay now, I know it can be hard to be back home where it all happened"

"Thank you, I'm really glad you are here to talk to"

"We are family now, and now that you are all better go find this skevy unsub so you guys can come back home to me" I let out a laugh and wipe away the remaining few tears I have.

"Okay, we will" I hang up and go into the next room to watch my team giving the profile. I watch Spencer as he is standing up there, he is listing off facts and statistics, something that most people would find boring but I could listen to him for hours. It is times like this when I start to wonder how we work. What would a certified genius see in someone like me? Average. But I know his heart, his big heart, and know that he would never turn away someone because they weren't as knowledgeable as him. He cares deeply and each time I look at him I can feel myself falling harder and harder for him. They all finish talking and then walk over to me, I can see Reid wanting to reach out to touch me but he decides against it, we have been too careless today, something we can't let happen again. I have those thoughts but know that I wouldn't have gotten through this day without him. "I just got off the phone with Garcia and she said that all three pairs of our victims visited the same restaurant before they were killed, our unsub must work there or frequently visit there"

"So now we have pinpointed a hunting ground" Hotch says.

"Garcia says she is going to text us all the address" I tell them.

"Good, Izzy I want you and Morgan to go to the restaurant and interview everyone that works there, tell Garcia to go through the records of all the employee's and we can weed out who wouldn't be our unsub. JJ and Reid I want you to interview the families of our latest victims and find out what you can about them and their patterns, where they could have possibly crossed paths with our unsub. Rossi and Prentiss I need you guys to go to the morgue where the latest two bodies are" We all nod and then disperse, I follow Morgan out to the car and get in, at first there is a comfortable silence but then Morgan begins to speak.

"I won't say anything about you and Reid, you can trust me to keep your secret" He announces, Spencer must have told him how worried I was about everyone finding out. It isn't that I am worried what people will think, I am worried that our job will be the reason we can't be together. I love what I do, every unsub I catch and put away is so many more people who are safe, but if it came down to it I really don't know what I would choose. It is a honor to work at the BAU, but what I have with Reid is special and I know that, I just hope it never has to come down to a choice. I am afraid what he will choose, but even more afraid of what I would choose.

"Thank you, Spencer already told me that you would be able to keep our secret" I tell him.

"Well for what it's worth I think you are really good for him"

"Thank you"

"Reid is like my little brother, and I have seen the way he is around you and how happy you make him, he has a good heart and will always treat you right" Morgan tells me. This is the second time I have heard someone talk up Reid to me, it's like they are his protectors and want to make sure that I know what he is like.

"I promise I will never hurt him, I could never do that to him"

"I know, he just hasn't had much experience or luck in the love department and I just want you to know that no matter what he does or says sometimes he is good at heart and cares very deeply, he has tendencies to be all facts sometimes but when it really comes down to it he thinks with his heart and not his brain" I find Morgan's words comforting, they just reassured me about what I already know about him.

"He is so special, and that's why I don't anyone to know, because I know that it might not look great seeing two profilers being in a relationship"

"I don't see anything wrong with it, for a long time Garcia was in a relationship with a fellow bureau member, no one seemed to have a problem with that. I know it might be scary but if it comes down to it I will have your back. Reid is like my brother, he is the godfather to my son, you are part of our family now and we protect family"

"Thank you, Derek it really means a lot"

"And I want you to know that I am truly sorry about your mom, my father died when I was young and I had to grow up without a father, I know what it is like to have something and then lose it"

"Morgan I am sorry"

"It's okay, I don't let my past define me, I just let it motivate me to do what I do everyday" Morgan parks the car and we get out and go into the restaurant, Morgan opens the door for me and I walk in with him following behind me. We walk up to the hostess and she greats us with a smile.

"Will it just be the two of you today?" She ask, I almost laugh considering Morgan clearly has a wedding ring on and I don't, either she doesn't notice or she chooses to ignore it.

"Actually we are here to ask you and the other employee's a few questions" Morgan says as he pulls out his badge and I do the same.

"Yes, what can I do for you two?" She asks.

"How many staff members do you have currently working here?"

"Probably around 20, I'm kinda new so I don't really know everyone here" She responds.

"Is there anyone not here today that would usually work?" I ask.

"There might have been some call offs, I can't pinpoint who exactly though, would you like to speak to my manager?"

"That would be great" Morgan tells her.

"I'll go get him" She pauses. "But may I ask what this is all about?"

"We have six people who have been murdered and they all visited this restaurant before they died"

"Oh my god" She breaths out. She doesn't say anything else but walks away. I look around the place and try and see any obvious places that would usually be filled but now are empty currently. I turn my attention to the bar and notice the clear lack of experience the bar tender has, he looks clumsy and obviously isn't very confident, I notice the way he keeps looking down at a sheet that must have a list of all the different types of drinks and how to make them. A tall man with dark brown hair comes over to us, he is wearing a casual suit and looks confident but I can see a hint of worry in his eyes. He must know the severity of this all. He reaches out and shakes my hand and then Morgan's.

"Hi, I'm Mike Taylor, Angie said you guys were FBI agents?"

"Yes, I am SSA Morgan and this is SSA Santiago, we are with the behavioral analysis unit. We are here investing the murders of six people"

"And you think my restaurant has something to do with it?" He asks, there is an edge to his voice.

"What we know is that all three of our couples visited here the night they were murdered, we think our unsub frequently visits here and uses it as his hunting ground"

"Unsub?" He is confused by our terminology.

"Unidentified subject" I clarify.

"And you think someone that works here could be involved?"

"It is a possibility" Morgan says.

"Was your usual bartender absent from work today?" I ask, Morgan looks at me questioningly, I try and give him a reassuring look. Let him know that I know what I am doing.

"Actually he was, this is a new guy we are training right now so we have him filling in. Our usual guy Tom wasn't here today, called in again"

"Does he do that often?"

"He has done it a couple of times more recently, I have let it slide because I've felt bad for him"

"Why is that?" Morgan asks.

"His grandmother recently died"

"We are going to need a list of all your employee's, a list of your regular customers, and a list of all the days that Tom has worked in the past month"

"Okay, I'll go grab my records for you guys" He goes into the back while Morgan and I wait.

"Good catch on the bartender" Morgan smiles at me, I can tell he is impressed.

"I noticed that guy looked inexperienced, probably a replacement, it wasn't hard to put two and two together"

"Well I'm certainly impressed, you have really caught on to this profiling thing pretty quickly" I accept the compliment with a smile. Mike walks back over to us and hands us a file.

"This is a list of all my employee's and their work schedules for the past month, I also have a list of names of people who have been in regularly for the past month as well, I hope that was helpful"

"It was, thank you"

"Let me know if there is anything else I can do to help"

"Trust me, we will" Morgan says and then we go to leave. "Was it just me or was that guy really eager?" Morgan asks me.

"He did seem that way but to be honest he probably just wanted us to leave his restaurant, it probably doesn't look too good having two FBI agents coming into a place investigating employees for murder"

"True, I still want Garcia to look in on him though" He pull out his phone and dials Garcia's number, he puts her on speakerphone. "Hey baby girl" He says into the phone.

"Hey Garcia" I say.

"Hello my sweets, what can my mad skills do for you?" She asks playfully.

"I need you to work your magic and look into the records of a Mike Taylor"

"Baby, that is easy. I'll save my magic for something that would be way harder" I can hear her typing away at her computer over the phone as she is looking up information on our new number one helper. "Mike Taylor, he is 31 and is the manager of a restaurant, besides a couple of speeding tickets he doesn't seem to have a record, he actually seems pretty normal and boring if you ask me"

"Was anyone in his life involved in any car accidents?" Morgan asks.

"That is a nada"

"Okay, I need you to pull up the records of every employee that works at his restaurant and see if there is anyone named Tom listed" I can hear Garcia tapping away again and then there is a pause.

"There is only one person who is close to that name and that is a Thomas Walton" I open up the file and look and see the work schedule for a Thomas Walton, it says he has called in around four times in the past month and a half. I nod my head at Morgan.

"Yes, look into Thomas Walton"

"Let's see, he is 30 and works as a bartender, he has been working there for little under a year, he graduated high school, went to college, he seems to be pretty plain"

"Did he have a recent death in the family?" Morgan asks. "Mike, told us that he thought his grandmother had recently died" I hear the tapping again and then she stops.

"Yes, his grandmother died at 76, she actually died a little over a month ago. I would imagine he took it pretty hard considering his grandmother was his legal guardian"

"Why is that?" I ask her.

"Oh my god"

"Garcia, what is it?" I ask.

"She was his legal guardian because when he was ten years old his parents died in a car accident"

"How did it happen?" I ask her.

"They were driving home when they were hit by a semi truck driver that had been driving for a full 24 hours without sleep, his father was killed instantly and his mother was rushed to the hospital but died on the way there. It gets worse though because the scene of the crime was where the first car with the bodies was found"

"But why would the death of the grandmother be the stresser? His parents died so long ago, what was it that made his release all this anger all of a sudden?" I say to everyone. That doesn't make sense, the stresser would have to hit closer to home for him to go on this rampage of vicious murders.

"Look and see if there was anything else major that happened before or after the death" Morgan tells her.

"I am checking, it looks like the next day after she died a document that had been sealed for 30 years was finally unsealed"

"What was it?"

"It was adoption records, Thomas was adopted when he was a baby by the Walton's, it looks like his mother Sara was only 16 when she had him and was unable to take care of him, she gave him up but he was soon adopted"

"There is the stresser, grandma must have told him on her death bed, not wanting to have a guilty conscious she told him, only it made him spiral out of control"

"Thank you Garica" Morgan says and then hangs up. He starts the car and we race back to the station.

Morgan and I walk into the building and find our team all together. "We found our unsub" I announce. They all look at us anxiously waiting for us to tell them.

"His name is Thomas Walton, he is a 30 year old bartender at the restaurant all the victims visited before they died. We think the stresser was when his grandmother died she might have revealed to him that his parents, who had died in a car accident 20 years earlier, weren't actually his parents. He was adopted but never unsealed the records until around a month ago" Morgan finishes.

"Right when the murders started" JJ says.

"There is actually a linkage between adoptive children and murders, currently there is at least 500 known serial killers and from that group 16% were adopted. Some of the most famous killers were actually adopted such as Aileen Wuornos, Kenneth Bianchi, one of the hillside stranglers and even Ted Bundy" Reid adds to the conversation. He is incredibly adorable when he is giving facts and statistics.

"He must feel betrayal and abandonment" Prentiss says. "The parents he remembers weren't even really his parents, he grew up remembering them and he feels stupid that he idolized these people that weren't actually his real parents. That must be why is killing of choice is strangulation, that need to feel close to someone, especially when you are literally holding their life in their hands"

"Garcia says the birth mother is a Sara Miller who was only 16 when she had him, she gave him up and went on to get married and have two other kids later in her life" I say.

"So there is even more abandonment, he feels like he lost his birth mother and was given to this family only to have them taken away from him, while she gets to have a family, raise kids, but none of whom were him" Prentiss says.

"That is why he rapes woman, he hates them. He hates his birth mother in particular" Rossi says.

"Where does Sara Miller live?" Hotch asks.

"Garcia said she still lives in town, she moved away after the birth but moved back when she got married and had her two other kids" Morgan says.

"We need to get to her house, she is the object of her rage and we need to get her protection" Hotch says and then is pulling out his phone, I can hear him calling Garcia as we are going out to the car. "I need her phone number and address" I get in the backseat next to Reid while Prentiss sits up from, JJ, Rossi and Morgan are in the car behind us and as soon as Hotch gets the address he calls Morgan to tell him where it is. We race off to the house and when my hand is down on the seat I can feel Reid's fingers find mine. It is comforting and I try not to look at him, not wanting to ruin this little moment we have. We pull up to a house and all of us are jumping out of the car, there is a single car in the driveway, someone is obviously home. Hotch tried calling Sara our way over here but it kept going to voicemail, never a good sign. Hotch knocks on the door. "Sara, Sara Miller, I am SSA Hotchner with the FBI and I need you to open up the door" Hotch leans close to the door trying to hear anything.

"The back is clear" JJ says as her and Rossi come back from the back of the house. Morgan is leaning into the windows trying to see anything that might give indication that someone is inside. I look around when I notice a black car parked across the street, it is empty and I run up to it and dial Garcia's number.

"Garcia I need you to run a licence plate for me" I read her off the jumble of letters and numbers and from the moment I hear the little gasp from her end of the phone I know it's his car.

"That car is registered under Thomas Walton's name" I don't even say goodbye when I hang up the phone and run back over.

"That car over there is empty, and it's registered to Thomas" I am still pointing at the car when Hotch is breaking the door down. We run inside and find every single family picture has the glass shattered, you can barley recognize the smiling faces of a happy family. I follow Hotch and Morgan in with my gun drawn, ready for the unexpected. Sitting in the middle of the room with her legs and arms tied is a blonde woman dressed in sweatpants and a t-shirt, it looks like she just got back from the gym. She walked into her home not expecting that her past was going to catch up with her, she just thought this was any other normal day. When I get up close I can see her eyes are closed, I brush aside her shade of blonde hair that matches the one Thomas has in the drivers licence picture I've seen, and bend down and put my fingers up to her neck. I can feel the faint rhythm of a pulse. "She is still alive" I call out. Morgan bends down and helps me start to untie her.

"She is going to need a medic" Morgan calls out, he then dials 911 for an ambulance to come, she has a gash on her head that has left a blood stain on the carpet, something that doesn't really matter much in retrospect. Morgan holds her in his lap and I notice that everyone has left the room, looking for where our unsub could be. I stand up and Morgan gives me a look of knowing that I should go. I know Morgan can handle himself but something makes me feel uneasy about leaving him alone. I notice the back screen door is wide opened and I walk out with my gun ready, I find that Thomas is already tackled to the ground being handcuffed and read his rights. As he is standing up he takes one look at me and I feel a chill run down my spine, just that look in his eye makes my skin crawl. He is taken away and put into a cop car and I feel like a weight has been lifted off me, with this case over and done with I can start to put this behind me.

I finish packing up my stuff and walk up to JJ, she usually knows the flight plans and hopefully I will have enough time to do what I want to do before we leave. She smiles when she sees me. "Hey Izzy"

"Hey, do you know when our flight is supposed to leave?"I ask her, part of the perks of flying in your own private jet is you can be ready to leave a the drop of a hat, meaning we have a very flexible schedule.

"We are supposed to leave tomorrow afternoon, there is supposed to be some snow in Virginia and they just want to be safe, it was pushed back from the morning to afternoon, why do you ask?"

"I wanted to know if I would have time to do something before we left, I should be able to. Do you think they will let me barrow one of the cars?" I am going to need to drive the five hours there and five hours back, I will probably end up driving all night but it will be worth it.

"I'm sure that wouldn't be a problem"

"Okay, thank you" I give her a smile and I can tell that she is curious as to what I am doing but she doesn't ask questions, she knows that if I want to tell her I will. I go to grab my bag when Spencer walks up to me.

"Hey"

"Hi" We haven't talked much since my big melt down earlier and I am worried that things might be awkward, something I never thought would happen between the two of us.

"Leaving so soon?" He jokes, he actually made a joke. He is really trying.

"I was actually about to leave to go do something"

"Oh, well will it take long? I was hoping make we could go get dinner" He sounds hopeful, and honestly dinner sounds amazing right now, especially with him, but I have put this off for too long. It is now or never and now seems like an especially good time.

"I'm actually about to drive to L.A." I sound crazy, especially when I say it out loud but apparently not to him.

"I'll come with you, I can drive" He doesn't even skip a beat, it's as if I had said the most perfectly logical thing to him right now.

"Spencer, you hate driving"

"I do not" He protests.

"Yes you do, you rarely ever drive" I point out to him.

"That is besides the point, you can't be driving all by yourself so late at night"

"I carry a gun, I think I'll be fine"

"But it isn't safe, let me drive at least part way" He does have a good point, I shouldn't be driving so many hours straight like that.

"Fine, but let's stop for coffee first to make sure we are both energized, there will be no sleeping for me if you aren't either" He smiles at me and leads me out to the car. We grab some coffee and then I start to program our destination into the GPS, as he starts to drive I notice how late it is a know that we definitely will be driving through the whole night. "Wow, first trip as a couple, big step" I joke with him.

"It's not our first trip, I mean I know they are cases but we technically take trips all the time together" He says it very seriously, not at all like a joke and I don't know if it is the time of night or the past two days I've had but I start cracking up laughing. It makes me smile and ask me what over and over again while it takes me all I have not to reach over across and kiss him right on the mouth. We drive and drive and drive, with the car filled with a mix of music, conversation and laughter. Being with Reid is never a dull moment, and even when it is, it is a comfortable one. I keep my word about staying up the whole time but he refuses to let me drive, telling me I am exhausted and really should get some sleep. I tell him I will when he does. I can see the pink of the morning sky outside the car window when the images of tombstones fill my eyes. Reid pulls into the cemetery. We park and then get out, before I will even step foot on the premise I go across the street and buy some flowers. I have been coming to the same shop every single time I visit, the guy behind the counter used to recognize me, even call me by name, but when I walk in there it is someone knew and then it hits me how long it has really been. I try and push that thought from my mind, and my heart. Just thinking about it is enough to make me want to start crying already. As we walk back across the street I feel Spencer's hands hand take mine and lace my fingers with his. We walk up to the place I know so well and I breathe out words I haven't said in a while.

"Hi mom" I say quietly, I don't care if he hears but something about the way I talk to my mom has always been private, just for the two of us. I have never been spiritual, my mom was raised catholic and my father wasn't so religion wasn't ever talked about in our house, it was a way my parents made it work for a long time but then one day it just stopped. I am not even sure I believe in the existence of God but I do know that I talk to my mom and it is something that makes me feel better. I let go of Reid's hand for just a second so I can bend down and put the flowers down next to where she is buried. I kiss the stone and then run my fingers over the words "wonderful mother" that has been forever carved into the stone. I stand back up and take his hand again and just let everything fall over me, the case, the fact that after so many years of not facing this I am standing in front of my mom's grave with my boyfriend by my side. "She would have loved to meet you" I say aloud.

"I would have loved to meet her" He replies. I promised myself I wouldn't cry but just hears his words makes the tears begin to fall, I know in my heart he is 100% true.

 **Reid's POV**

I hear Izzy yawn as we board the jet, she managed to stay awake with me the entire drive there and back, no matter how many times I told her it was okay she refused. She can be stubborn sometimes but when she sets her mind to something she sticks with it. She sits down on the couch and I sit down next to her, I realize we are the only ones sitting so close to one another currently but her tried brain must not realize how obvious we are being currently. I don't mind right now, I don't care if people know about us or not, I just want to be with her. It is only moments after we have taken off when she has broken that distance between us and is laying her head on my shoulder sleeping peacefully. I look around and notice the smiles I am getting from everyone around us. "She's just kind of tired" I tell them all.

"Oh I bet she is" Pretniss says as she smirks, it earns a laugh from everyone else but I don't get what she means. How could she have possibly have known what we were doing? I pull out my book and begin to read, I lean back so Izzy will be more comfortable, I am flipping the page when I notice she is actually wearing a short sleeved shirt. She must have changed before we bored but instead of wearing long sleeves like usual she is letting her arms be seen. Her beautifully tanned skin accents the light orange shirt she is wearing, I smile at the fact that she is now comfortable enough to let her deepest secrets be exposed like that, it's like something set her free. I smile and when no one is looking I plant a small kiss on top of her head and then continue reading, I can feel her breathing and know that is a sound I could continue to listen to for the rest of my life.

 **Izzy's POV**

I walk into the BAU with my arms exposed again, I wore a short sleeved shirt on the plane yesterday and am still feeling good about my decision, if they see then they see, if it ever comes up I am not going to shy away from the truth. They are apart of me, they are an ugly part of me but still apart of me the same and I am no longer ashamed. They are my family and if they ask I will tell them. I walk to my desk with Spencer's scarf still around my neck and know that I am going to do this now, that I am ready. He is sitting at his desk and I take his hand in mine and begin to walk him over to the steps that lead to Hotch's office. "What are you doing?" He asks me, he is clearly confused.

"Something I should have done a long time ago" I say as I knock on Hotch's office door.

"Come in" I hear him call out and I walk in to find him finishing up the paperwork from our most recent case.

"Hotch I need to talk to you about something" I say, I take Reid's hand in mine again and then say more clearly than ever "We need to talk to you about something" I can tell we have caught his attention because he sets his pen down.

"Okay" He doesn't sound angry, just curious.

"Reid and I have been dating for about a month" I blurt out, I knew if I didn't just say it quickly I might never say it.

"I know" He simply replies.

"What?" Reid asks.

"Guys, we are a team of profilers, it wasn't hard to tell you two have been involved in a romantic relationship"

"And you are okay with it?" I ask hesitantly.

"Well I am going to need you two to fill out some paper work but yes, it is perfectly okay that you two are in a relationship. What I am going to have to say as your unit chief is that you two need to be committed because no matter what happens in your personal life you need to be fully committed to this team, if you two were to break up there is no room for drama in this department, people's lives are constantly at stake"

"Yes sir" I say.

"But as your friend, I am very happy for the two of you" He says and it makes me feel a little bit better. I smile at him and then look out the window and down and notice there is now a crowd around our desks. JJ, Garcia, Morgan, Prentiss, and Rossi are all standing around looking up at us. We leave the office and I can feel another weight lifted off my shoulders, you would have thought that a conversation like that would have freaked us out but it didn't. The sound of being committed to each other didn't scare me at all. We walk down the steps and find everyone waiting anxiously for what they probably already know.

"Izzy and I are dating" Reid says, I am surprised he took control like that but he did and it gives me the biggest smile.

"It's about time" Prentiss says as they all crowd around us to give us hugs, this is a happy event and I can tell they are all supportive. We are enjoying the sweet feeling of relief when Hotch comes out of his office and down to us.

"There is another case" He says and we start making our way to the room where we spend most of our lives, but together. I look around, back to work, another case to solve, another unsub to profile. Nothing has changed, and yet everything has changed.


	4. Folie à deux

**Izzy's POV**

I walk into the house with Spencer's hand in mine, his hand is warm and comforting and helps settle my nerves. He turns to me and gives me a big smile, I feel myself smiling back at him. Spencer opens the door and I can hear the laughter already coming from inside, it sounds like happiness, like a family. My family. It is weird to be holding hands with Spencer like this, being so open with our relationship but things have been more normal lately. We have been dating for a few months and the team has known for a little while now, we are more affectionate around the workplace but things still go on as normal. We turn the corner and I can smell the food Rossi must be cooking, he is a phenomenal chef and this won't be my first family dinner, it will be the first time meeting the families and loved ones of my new family though. As soon as we turn the corner the sound of children laughing come full force, I see a little blonde boy with glasses, he looks a lot like JJ and I can tell that must be her oldest son Henry. He is sitting on the couch talking with a boy a little older than him, his hair is lighter than Hotch's but I can tell he is Jack. They are laughing about something and look up when Reid and I walk in, the cries of "Uncle Spencer" ring through the air and Henry gets up and Jack follows behind as they run up to hug him. Reid lets go of my hand and pulls Henry into a hug, he picks him up and spins him around, he adores that kid and talks about him all the time. After he hugs Henry and sets him down he goes to hug Jack, both of the kids are ecstatic to see him. At the sound of his name JJ walks over with a toddler in her arms, he has the same shade of blonde hair that JJ and Henry have, he smiles at the sound of his uncle's name and claps his hands in a motion that he is wanting Reid to pick him up. "Spence, Izzy, I'm so glad you guys finally showed up" JJ says to us.

"I hope we aren't late" I tell her, I look around and now notice we must be the last to arrive.

"Your fine, JJ is just teasing you" Says a man in a thick Louisiana accent, he shares some of the same features as Henry and Michael and I can tell this must be JJ's husband Will. "I'm Will by the way" He extends a hand out to me and I shake it and smile at him.

"It's nice to meet you, I have heard a lot about you" I tell him. Michael starts to get fussy and JJ hands him over to Reid who wraps him in his arms tightly and starts to bounce him lightly. I look at him as he does this and I can see how comfortable he is holding the baby, he has clearly done this before and it makes my heart swell.

"Good things I hope" Will jokes with me. JJ wraps her arms around his middle and kisses his cheek.

"Mostly good things" She teases him.

"Well I have heard a lot of good things about you, JJ really likes having you on the team and it's nice to find someone that can keep up with Spencer" Will tells me. I laugh at his joke but Reid doesn't notice, he is now crouched down showing the kids a magic trick.

"Well I am glad to be on the team, and Spencer is really great" I tell him. Reid stands back up and wraps his arm around my back pulling me close to him. I smile and lean into him, he kisses me gently and when he pulls away he has a big smile on his face. Henry comes up to stand right in front of me, I give him a big smile and can see that he looks a little shy. "Hi Henry" I tell him.

"Hi" He says.

"I'm Izzy, it's really nice to meet you" I tell him, I want to make a good impression with him, he is probably one of the most important people in Spencer's life and I want to make sure he likes me.

"Hi Izzy, I am Henry" He meets my hand with his little one and I shake it. He pauses for a minute and then looks up at his uncle with his arm around my back. "Are you dating my uncle?" He asks me. His question takes me off guard and I can feel myself blushing.

"Yes we are" Reid answers him.

"Are you guys going to get married?" Henry asks us, this question takes us both off guard and I am at a loss for words. We have only been dating a few months and while I feel like things are serious between us I haven't even thought of marriage. I have let my mind wonder to where my future will be and I know that I see Reid standing there beside me, I just don't want to freak him out by imagining matching rings on our fingers.

"Okay Henry that is enough questions for now. Why don't you and Jack go see if uncle Dave has lunch ready" JJ tells him, she is steering away the conversation from the awkward situation we are in now.

"Okay mom" He says and then he runs off with Jack following behind him. Will has picked up Michael and I can tell he is trying not to laugh.

"Guys I am so sorry about that, he is kind of in a phase where he has questions for everything" JJ is apologizing to us.

"It's okay" I say, I can still feel Reid's arm around me but I can't look up at him. JJ and Will walk away to go follow the kids and Reid guides me over to where Garcia and Morgan are. Garcia has a baby in her arms, I instantly recognize him as the same baby that fills up many of the pictures on Morgan's desk, and a few pictures in Reid's apartment. Garcia is holding Hank in her arms and talking with the woman standing next to her, she has light brown skin and she is gorgeous. I have heard so much about Savannah but have yet to meet her. As we get closer I can hear Garcia cooing over her god son, she is planting small kisses on his head and I watch as both Morgan and Savannah share smiles.

"I just want to take him home with me" Garcia says in between giving Hank kisses.

"Baby girl you can't take him home with you, it would just break my heart and you wouldn't want that would you?" Morgan teases her.

"You are lucky I want to keep your big heart intact. But couldn't I just borrow him for a weekend?" She asks Savannah.

"I'll tell you what Penelope, next time we need a date night you will be the first one we call" Savannah tells her.

"You could always ask us too" Spencer tells them. At the sound of his voice I can see Morgan's face break out into a smile, and an almost identical one soon follows on the face of the baby still in Garcia's hands. As we get closer I can see the similarities in Hank's face that he shares with his mom as well, a perfect mix of two incredible human beings, not only in looks but skills as well. She is a doctor and he is one of the greatest profilers I have ever met, the mix of genes he has in that little body of his is already such an advantage. I think of Henry and Michael, both of their parents are heroes. Thinking of all the overwhelming amount of perfection in this room is enough to make me dizzy.

"Pretty boy, you finally decided to stop by" Morgan teases him. Morgan pulls him into a tight hug. I watch as Garcia hands Hank back to Savannah as she comes over to pull me into a hug.

"Izzy, I'm so glad you two are finally here" She practically screams as her arms wrap around me. As soon as she lets go she moves over to Spencer to hug him, it's like we trade because Morgan comes over to kiss my cheek and then hug me. When he pulls away he keeps his around my shoulder and steers me in the direction of his wife.

"This is my wife Savannah, and our son Hank. And Savannah, this is Izzy, not only is she a valuable member of our team but nowadays she is Reid's better half as well" Savannah hands Hank back to Garcia and pulls me into a quick hug.

"It is so nice to meet you finally" She tells me with a warm smile. "I have heard so much about you from Derek, he says you are quite the profiler" At the sound of her words I can feel a blush creeping along my cheeks.

"Thank you. I have definitely found my family within our team" I tell her and I watch as Garcia, Morgan, and Spencer start to smile. "And Hank is so adorable, Spencer talks about his all the time" I tell her.

"Isn't he just precious" Garcia agrees with me.

"Do you want to hold him?" Savannah asks me. I nod my head and she hands Hank over to me and I move my arms to get him in a comfortable position. I can feel him grab a piece of my hair, not in a rough way but it is gentle, a way for him to balance himself as he makes the transition from being in the arms of his mother to now a complete stranger. From the first touch my heart melts, he smiles up at me and I now truly understand Garcia's desire to take him home with her. He is so quiet and content, happy with who is holding him, happy with me. "He really likes you" Savannah tells me.

"Yeah, he really does" I can hear Spencer say. I try not to look up but I can feel his eyes glued to the scene in front of him. His girlfriend holding his god son, much less being so comfortable with holding a baby, especially a baby that is so important to him. The last thing I would want to do is scare away my boyfriend of four months but something about holding Hank feels so right, and I can't help but imagining a time where we will be having a family dinner, but this time Spencer and I will be the one leaving with a baby, our baby. I am pulled out of my trance by the sight of a new face. A tall man with dark brown hair comes up and wraps him arm around Garcia's middle, she smiles up at him and takes the drink he offers her.

"Izzy, this is my boyfriend Sam, Sam this is Izzy. She works at the BAU with us and she is also dating Reid" I move ever so gently and hand Hank to Spencer and extend my hand out to Sam.

"It is very nice to meet you" Sam tells me.

"It is nice to meet you too, Penelope has told me so much about you" I tell him. Garica's bubbly personality makes it easy for her to talk and talk, and since I have joined the team I have also joined the tradition of girls' night, along with Emily and JJ. Meaning that we are always the first to know the dish when it comes to Sam, so when I tell him that I have heard so much about him I don't mean that lightly. Since I am with Spencer and he is a member of the team I try and keep some parts of our relationship private for his sake, meaning that I am usually doing a lot of the listing, rather than the talking. They all try and get the details about how far our relationship has gone, it's an awkward subject as our relationship is not as physical as most people would probably be when it is coming up 5 months of dating, but our relationship isn't a typical one. Both of us have faced hardships in the past when it comes to relationships, it can be hard to be ready for that physical intimacy again when the last person we shared it with, is dead now. Whenever a question like comes up I try and distract them by telling them something that Spencer had done that was the sweetest thing. They already knew that while he may be awkward at times, and as brilliant as his beautiful mind is it has tendencies to be unable to read social situations, that he was one of the most caring people we all know. They all find it fascinating to see him in role as a boyfriend, rather than just a doctor and profiler.

"I wouldn't have expected anything less, our Penelope tends to be quite the talker" He jokes with us.

"Handsome and Funny, Sam is really the whole package" Garcia says as she snuggles up to him. I have heard that she used to date someone else who works within the FBI, another technical analyst but they broke up because they wanted different things, I have been told about how down she was and it makes me happy to know that she has someone else, this job can be a lot for someone, especially the ray of sunshine that is Penelope Garcia. Having someone to talk to, even someone who doesn't know the minds of killers like we do, can be cathartic to talk to about the job, they may not fully understand, but they can listen. It goes the same for relationships between JJ and Will, or Spencer and I, we have someone who knows exactly what we have been going through and that can be just as helpful.

"Lunch is ready" Emily says as she pokes her head around the corner, a smile fills her face as soon as she sees Spencer and I and she comes over for quick hugs.

"Emily" Spencer says and he hugs her tightly, everyone in our team shares a different kind of relationship with her. They all had to watch her die only to see a ghost as she came back months later, alive and well. Faking her own death to not only protect herself but the ones she love. I can see it in each and every one of their eyes whenever she is around, the way everyone cherishes her just a little bit more, but would never say it aloud. They know what it is like to live without her, and weather they notice it or not, they are always seeming like they are making up for lost time and will always make sure to get the most time with her as they possibly can. When she comes to hug me I can smell food on her, not in a bad way, but in a familiar way. The smell of Rossi's cooking radiating off everyone who has entered his house and our family.

"Sorry I didn't come to see you guys sooner, I was the first one here so I was helping Rossi cook with Joy" She tells me. Joy is the name of Rossi's daughter, I have never met her or her husband and son but have heard many stories and the pictures that fill Rossi's desk in his office.

"This must be extra special if Joy is in town" Spencer says. Emily nods her head and then follows Sam and Garcia into the kitchen, Spencer goes to follow them but I grab his arm and stop him. He looks confused until I take both of my hands up to his face and kiss him. He didn't expect it at first but after a second wraps his arms around my middle. It would look like he is about to pick me up considering I am standing on my tip toes in order to meet his lips, I kiss him a few more times and then let go of his face and wrap my arms around his neck. "What was that for?" He says through a smile, I can see the light in his beautiful brown eyes, the ones I could look into forever.

"Because of you. I was so nervous to meet everyone today but you have just been so great. And not to mention that you are the basically a kid magnet and it is one of the best things I have ever witnessed" I tell him and kiss him lightly once more. He smiles and I untangle my arms from his neck and take his hand and lead him into the kitchen. The sweet aroma of Italian cooking have found its way into every nook and cranny of this house but walking into the belly of the beast is a whole other sensation. There are flavors coming from everywhere. Sitting on the kitchen counter eating crackers is a young boy, he looks to be a little younger than Henry, he is dark brown skinned and is being watched by a light brown skinned woman and a tall man with skin the same shade of Rossi's. That must be Rossi's family, his daughter Joy and her husband and son Kai. I can see some similarities between Joy and Rossi, not so much in looks but in little mannerisms. I can tell they have the same type of focus whenever completing tasks, I can see how she is checking every dish that surrounds her, no doubt creating a mental list in her head about everything that is ready to be served. Once she looks content she takes Kai into her arms and set him down onto the ground and he runs over to where his grandpa is, with hands full of food.

"I see the lovebirds have finally made it into the kitchen, what were you two doing all by yourselves?" Morgan teases the two of us. I hope there isn't hint of a blush on my face because there is clearly one all over Spencer's. I lace our fingers together and we go over to the dinner table and sit down for the feast Rossi has just prepared. Joy smiles at me as she sits down a few seats down from mine.

"I'm Joy" She directs at me as her son is trying to get her attention. She pulls him from his own seat and into her lap.

"I'm Izzy" I tell her and wave back at Kai who is waving at me.

"My dad has said some really great things about you, he loves having you on the team" She tells me. I have gotten so many compliments today but this one means something in a different way, Rossi was the one who started the BAU, and the fact that he has talked about me to his daughter makes me feel really good.

"That really means a lot" I say and hope Rossi hears.

"This is my son Kai, he can be shy sometimes but it seems like he has taken a liking to you" She says as Kai has a huge smile on his face. Joy kisses Kai on the cheek and then starts to cut up some of his food on the plate. Morgan and Savannah are sitting at our end of the table with Hank in a car seat on the floor, still too little to sit at the table. While Henry is sitting in a chair between both of his parents, Will has Michael on his lap and is alternating between taking a bite of his own food and feeding some to Michael. Jack is sitting next to Hotch who is next to Emily over by Garcia and Sam who are down the opposite of Spencer and I. For the first few minutes after we all begin eating there seems to be mostly silence, us all just enjoying the food and the company. We spend our time talking about everything that doesn't actually involve work, it is nice to take a few hours away from psycho paths and serial killers and enjoy the company of each other and act like a more conventional family. After our plates have been cleared we are able to just talk, I am holding Spencer's hand on the table when he picks up my hand and kisses it gently, an act of PDA that is unusual for him, but nice. I watch the way that Joy and Rossi interact, he didn't know about her for most of her life but you wouldn't have noticed unless you were already told. They act so comfortable around each other, like they had been doing the whole father/daughter thing for only the past few years. Hotch looks down at his phone and I watch his face fall back into the same serious nature it usually is in.

"I'm so sorry but we just got a case" Hotch breaks the news to the whole table. Rossi gets up and starts to clear the table.

"It's okay dad, I'll clean up, it is the least I can do for you letting us stay with you" She smiles at him.

"You will always be welcome to stay at this house, anytime" Rossi wraps Joy into a hug and then Kai stands up and gives his grandpa a hug.

"Go on to work dad, someone needs you" Joy tells him and Rossi makes his way around the kitchen to find his stuff.

"I'll take the boys home" Will tells JJ as he stands up and hands Michael to her so she can say goodbye. I watch as Hotch bends down to Jack's level with a look on his face that looks rehearsed, the same look he must have ready every single time a new case comes up and he has to leave his son. I couldn't ever imagine that type of pain, especially for Hotch who is Jack's only parent left.

"We have to go buddy, I'll call aunt Jessica to come and pick you up but I promise that I will stay here with you until she shows up" Hotch tells him in a gentle voice. Hotch is keeping it together very well but I can see the cracks in the interior, I can see the pain behind his eyes that he is trying not to show.

"I'll take him if you want, he can hang out with Henry for a little while and then Jessica can pick him up from there" Will offers.

"Do you want to go over to aunt JJ's house and play with Henry?" Hotch asks Jack. I watch Jack nod his head in agreement. "Thank you Will" Hotch tells him and then bends down to give Jack a hug. I watch Savannah pick up the car seat that has Hank in it and take him out of the car seat and hand him to Morgan. Morgan kisses the top of his son's head and holds him close. He gives him back to Savannah and then kisses her, already knowing he is going to have to leave his family for a case.

"We will see you when you come back home" Savannah tells him and gives him one more kiss.

"We can give you a ride" Garcia offers Morgan.

"Thank you baby girl" I watch as the house slowly disperses, that bubble of a reality without unsubs is now popped and we all have to get back to the real world. I take Spencer's hand as we walk out of the house and into my car, I get into the driver's seat and he goes into the passenger's seat, we have fallen in a pattern, the familiarity with each other grows more and more each and every day. The whole time I am driving I can feel his looking at me, not in a creepy way but with a gaze full of love, not that I would ever utter that word aloud. That four letter word can have the power to either destroy or continue a relationship, say it too early and everything could implode. I wouldn't want to ruin what we have by saying it too early. I do love him, I loved him when I first joined the team. That was originally a different kind of love, the same way I love everyone on our team, but over the past few months I have grown to love him in the way that gives me visions of marriage and babies, another thing that would absolutely freak him out.

"You have been staring at me the entire time" I say through a laugh to him, I keep my eyes fixed on the road and can feel the temptation of looking over at him.

"Oh, sorry" He says sheepishly, I feel bad now.

"No, it's okay. I actually thought it was endearing" I reassure him. I hate it when I make him feel awkward like that, I know how hard he tries, relationships are new to him. Especially ones with people who aren't on the same intellectual wave length as him, he has reassured me that it doesn't matter to him, I remember how he looked when he told me, and I try and think about it whenever I feel insecure.

"I guess I was just excited to see you with everyone today, I mean I know you care about them too but they are some of the most important people in my life and now that you are too I just like seeing you at the family dinners" He is stumbling over his words slightly nervous, I feel myself smiling when he tells me I am one of the most important people in his life.

"Spencer" I say to him and then stop. I can feel myself losing my nerve to tell him, seal that deal of letting him know I love him.

"Yes" He replies.

"Do you want me to stop at your apartment to get your go bag?" I chicken out.

"No, I always keep a spare in a drawer in my desk. With the amount we travel we practically live out of suitcases-" He laughs and then gets serious as he continues "the only good thing is that it will be easier if you moved in since you usually have some sort of bag packed for cases" He doesn't even skip a beat between talking about me moving in one day, he goes straight into rambling about where we could possibly be going this time. I can't focus on anything new he is saying, I'm fixated on his comment about me moving in, the fact that he even has thoughts like that makes me want to tell him that I love him. In that big beautiful brain of his, all jumbled together with equations and theories and random facts that would seem useless to some but actually help us out a lot, all mixed in with that are thoughts of me. I can feel my heart swell, maybe my thoughts today of babies and marriage wouldn't scare him. His brain does tend to move and work faster than others, maybe he can already start to comprehend all of this. We pull up to the bureau and I pull into my spot, I get out of the car and try and contain my excitement, he might not even realize what he has said, it was just a thought in his head that was relevant to the conversation that we were having and it just slipped out. I try and act natural, we haven't even slept over at each other's places, much less have sex yet, moving in would have to come behind both of those things, but just the thought of him seeing our relationship moving forward is something exciting to me. I find my go bag in the trunk, I can feel him standing there and watching me the whole time I was looking for it. I turn to face him and realize how close he is standing to me.

"I found it" I tell him, I can feel my breath getting shorter being in such close proximity to him. I suddenly start to feel nervous a little, the same butterflies I got on our first few dates.

"Do you want me to carry it for you?" He offers. I nod my head and get on my tip toes to kiss his cheek. I didn't really think of our height difference that much until I was super close to him like I am now. I hand him my bag and I feel our hands brush, I can't even listen to myself think, my thoughts sound like the ones of a middle school talking to her crush for the first time. We walk together, this time without our hands joined. Walking into the FBI holding hands would not be very professional, no matter how much I want to be close to him right now. When we get up to the office the rest of the team has all just arrived, I can already see the smirk on Morgan's face. I brace for the witty comment about Spencer and I, no doubt making some joke about us unable to keep our hands off each other.

"Looks like the love birds have finally made it" He teases us as we walk past him while heading for the stairs. He is right behind us and his mouth keeps running. Morgan is by far one of the sweetest people I have ever met in my life, and he always means well but when a big brother's little brother gets a girlfriend there is going to be some teasing to be expected.

"We hit some traffic" Spencer informs him.

"Oh, is that what the kids are calling it nowadays" I playfully hit his arm and he puts his hands up in surrender. "Okay, I'm done" He laughs it off and whispers something to Spencer,that I can hear. "you got yourself a feisty one, that's good for you" We walk into the room and Garcia is setting up the monitor and some truly gruesome pictures fill the screen. It looks as what once was a body is now in pieces, still bloody pieces meaning this murder is fresh.

"I know, this absolutely disgusts me" Garcia tells us as we sit down. I take my normal seat next to Spencer and focus my attention up at the screen.

"How fresh is the body?" Spencer asks her, he is already thinking the same thing I was.

"The body was just found now but it looks like the actions of cutting the body into itty bitty pieces happened as soon as yesterday" She answers him.

"Then how did we know about this so fast? Did someone come across the body?" Prentiss asks her.

"That's the thing, while we do not know the name of this victim, something we are working on trying to identify right as I speak, and we don't have any idea if this body is the only one, we do have somewhat of a lead on who our unsub could be" She tells us all.

"How?' Hotch asks her.

"The reason we were able to get this case so fast and find the body is because a tip was called in my a concerned therapist who thought one of their patients was capable of committing a crime like this, and he knew this because after their last session he could tell his patient was agitated and mentioned having dreams and thoughts of cutting up his enemies" She tells the whole table, with the same look of shock on her face that we all have. We could already have our unsub. "Our case is in Vegas, the wonderful hometown of our one and only boy wonder, Reid" I can see a little bit of light in this obvious dark case, going to where Spencer is from, he might have time to visit his mom, something I know would make his happy. It also might give me the opportunity to meet her, getting to know someone as important as my boyfriend's mom will really cement the seriousness of our relationship. A step I know I am ready to take, hopefully one he is ready to take as well, I mean he has mentioned moving in together, I'm sure he will be thrilled to introduce me to his mom.

"We need to get down there very soon, we need to find this therapist and ask him what he knows. Wheels up in 20" Hotch says and then is the first to leave the room, with the rest of us following close behind.

"We are going to where you grew up, if we have time you will have to show me around, and we can go see your mom" I tell him as we leave the room and head to grab our bags.

"Yeah" Is all he responds with, he doesn't seem as excited as I would assume he would be from the way he talks about his mom, there is something wrong but I can't seem to pinpoint exactly what it is.

 **Reid's POV**

Izzy sits next to me on the jet, we all sit anxiously waiting on any update on who are victim is and if they could locate the therapist who called in the tip. I can feel her inching her hand near mine, she is surprisingly in a good mood about going to Vegas, she couldn't stop going on about me showing her around places, something that I am excited about. I would love to take her to some of my favorite places but she keeps bringing up seeing my mom, something that I am not sure is a good plan. My mom's mind is going through a lot, she gets confused more easily and I just don't think introducing her to a new person right now is such a great idea. I've let Izzy know about the schizophrenia and the conditions I grew up in, I know my mom tried her best, always, that is something that I never will dispute but the schizophrenia really took a toll on her. The onset alzheimers has confused her further, it has muddled her mind and greatly impaired her memory. I haven't told Izzy yet but there have been times when I am on the phone with my mom and she just simply doesn't remember who she is having a conversation with. So far it hasn't lasted more than a few moments, as soon as I restate my name she quickly can jump back into a conversation. Those few moments are already heart wrenching and while they are brief I know they are just a glimpse of the dark road ahead. I don't want to hurt Izzy, that is that last thing I want to do, but introducing my mom to a new person just doesn't seem like the best thing right now. When she finally does take my hand I let her, she turns and smiles at me and she can instantly tell there is something wrong, I can see it in her eyes.

"What is wrong?" She asks me, the ability for her to know me so well can sometimes be a blessing, her ability to understand me completely is something that helps her to be ahead of everyone else and be on the same page as me, for so long it was just me ahead of everyone but somehow she has found a way for her mind to move as fast as mine. Blessings can sometimes be a curse, and its times like this when they really are. She is already anticipating that there is something different in my usual behavior, she is studying my behavior, doing her job as a profiler I suppose.

"Just waiting to get information on the case, that's all. The fact that our potential unsubs psychiatrist had to call in a tip means that he could be deteriorating mentally and could easily be a sign that he is already devolving, meaning that his actions will be all over the place instead of planned and it will just be harder for us to find him" I can feel myself rambling, I know to most people the normal response I get when I tend to ramble is annoyance or just ignoring me, but the way she looks at me, authentically hanging onto every single word that is coming out of my mouth. She looks at me with such a fascination, something that I know she really means.

"Yeah, your right. From what I already know about the case it seems like the crime is either disorganized or the result of a psychotic break and either doesn't seem like it would be a better option for the general public, especially if this guy is on the loose" She tells me. Just looking into those big brown eyes of hers makes me just want to tell her, open up about what has been happening with my mom, I know she would understand and want to be there but it is something that I just can't talk about right now, my mom means the world to me and her schizophrenia was one thing but that was something I learned to deal with over the years as I grew up but now, adding something else onto that is just too hard sometimes. She continues to go on about the possibilities of the case, something I would normally be excited about but I can feel my mind begin to cloud. Consumed with the thoughts and fears for my mother. I am trying to think of what I can say next to her that won't make the truth come spilling out, I already feel like I am lying to her and it's making me feel guilty, I never wanted to hide anything from her, especially not my feelings. The sound of Garcia's voice fills the jet and I get out of my seat to get closer to the screen, I can feel the warmth of Izzy's hand leave mine and I feel guilty yet again, such a small gesture now means the world to me, now that I have someone I really care about.

"Hello, hello" Her bright voice says over the screen, her glasses match her outfit, something I don't think I had noticed earlier.

"What do you got for us Garcia?" Hotch asks her, he sits a few seats down from Izzy and ,I around JJ, Prentiss, Morgan and Rossi. The two of us separated, as if we are in our own little world. When I move to get closer I lean against Morgan's chair, Izzy just adjusts her position so she can see better, something I could have easily done, I hope she is focused enough on the case that she didn't notice.

"I don't have much as you guys would want, I am very sorry guys" She tells us, I can tell there is disappointment with herself in her voice, upset that she can't do more to help the team out right now.

"That's okay baby girl, why don't you tell us what you have so far" Morgan comforts her.

"What I do have is a trace to the call that was picked up by 911, the therapist didn't give his name but did give the name of his patient, his patients name is Johnathan King and so of course I looked him up and there is only a handful of people who have that same name in the area so I will have to do more research into that but I did get the recording of that 911 call for you guys to listen to" Garcia clicks a button and then another voice begins talking.

 _"911, what is your emergency?"_

 _"I want to report a patient, I really think he is going to do something"_

 _"Sir, are you with this person right now? Is your life in any kind of danger?"_

 _"No, but he just stormed out of my office and he was telling me he had been having dreams about killing people, chopping them up into little pieces and killing people"_

 _"Sir, what is this man's name? Did he threaten you or anyone else?"_

 _"He didn't threaten me or even anyone specifically but he said he wanted to hurt people. His name is Johnathan King and I am his therapist, please, you need to stop him"_ There is a click on the other line.

 _"Sir, are you there? Are you still there?"_ There is no answer and eventually she just hangs up the phone, leaving the silence to move through the recording and onto our jet. We all sit, with the exception of me standing, but all the same look on our face and the feeling of utter disbelief. The chilling conversation, still resonating through all of us.

"Creepy right?" Garcia says as she breaks the silence.

"Any idea about who the caller could be?" Hotch asks her.

"I'm still tracing it now sir, it was harder to do because they weren't on the phone for very long but I've got some tricks up my sleeves, it is just going to take a little longer than usual" She tells Hotch.

"Just keep working your magic for us mamma" Morgan tells her, his words earn a smile from her and she seems less on edge.

"Thank you Garcia" Hotch tells her and she is content, his encouragement allows her to focus on the case at hand.

"I won't let you down sir" She says and then with a click her face disappears off the screen. After she is gone a simultaneous bing erupts from all the tablets indicating that Garcia has sent us all something pertaining to the case. I pick up my paper copies, preferring these to the electronic copies, having all these innovations only is continuing the demise of paper copies. Soon books will be considered obsolete and that is something that scares me. Before Izzy I only used my phone for purposes of the case, but now I find myself calling her on the phone every night, even after spending the whole day with her I still want to have endless conversations with her.

"It looks like we finally found the identity of our victim, he was a homeless man named Daniel Campbell, his fingerprints were in the database from when he was arrested for stealing a couple of months ago. It looks like he had been homeless for a while, they had to contact his estranged sister to identify the body" Hotch says allowed, everyone is scrolling through their tablets looking for information that can help us find this unsub.

"So we know our unsub is mentally ill, maybe part of his illness has something to do with hating homeless people, that isn't anything we haven't seen before" JJ says.

"Or he could have been controlling his urges so long that when he finally did snap he just needed that instant gratification and he killed the first person he saw, in this case a very unlucky homeless man" Prentiss counters off JJ's point.

"From what we have seen so far I would classify this unsub as some mix of unorganized but also has the preciseness to cut up the bodies, not an easy task, especially not something that a scattered man who had previously made a confession about his desires would be able to perform under so much pressure" Morgan says. He has that look on his face, the same one he always gets when he is trying so hard to get to the bottom of the case but nothing is seeming to budge. Izzy says I have a distinct look on my face, she says it's a mix of concentration and frustration, she described it as cute that night we laid together with her wrapped in my arms after we both had a few drinks. It was nice, and I remember her voice as she whispered that to me, the smell of her hair, and the way she kissed me afterword. It never has gone much farther than kisses, then it wouldn't have been fair, we were both a few drinks in and it would have been taking advantage, and I wouldn't want our first time to be during a drunken night. So we laid there, just enjoying each other's company and that was enough, she is always enough for me, even more if that is possible. I am a man of logic and facts, but when I am with her it somehow isn't the only thing that matters, it seems as if she is the only thing that matters. She notices me starting at her, she smiles and I don't feel embarrassed, more disappointed that I am not telling her how I feel, I used to be such a forward person but worrying about feelings, especially those who are close to me, are something that always come first. But allowing her to get excited about something and then upsetting her isn't something I want to do.

"Maybe the reason he was being treated was for a form of personality disorder" I offer. I watch their reactions, my realization suddenly dawning on them and making absolute sense.

"That would explain the presence of disorganization but also the ability to complete the process of cutting up a body with the preciseness that is needed" Izzy says to everyone.

"We will have to talk to the therapist and also examine the body. Rossi and JJ, I want you two to come with me to set up at the station and begin to talk to the sister of the victim, Morgan and Reid, I want you two to go to the Medical Examiners office and look at the body, Reid that will give you a chance to see up close if your theory is right. Prentiss and Izzy, I want you guys to go to the office of the therapist and interview him, as soon as Garcia sends us the address of where the call came from I will have an address for you guys" Hotch tells us, we all nod in response and I go back to sit down next to Izzy. I look out the window and don't say anything, just watching the passing clouds as we head closer and closer to the state I once called my home.

"I can't wait to get to Vegas, hopefully we will have time for you to show me around and finally meet your mom" She says, giving me the perfect opportunity to tell her I am scared, I have an irrational fear that by introducing her to my mom is inviting her into my world of unpredictability and the little bit of memory she has left will be consumed with seeing everything she will miss out on with me. Introducing my mom to my future will make it that much more real that there is a possibility she won't get the time to learn all the wonderfulness that is my Izzy, and that scares me.

Morgan and I stand in front of what remains of this body, all the pieces of the body lay scattered around the two tables that stand before us, the torso and the head are still connected but the arms are disfigured and in multiple pieces, along with the legs. The head is still connected to what is left of what once was his body but there is a deep slit along the throat. His head isn't yet decapitated but it was awfully close to being off, whoever killed this man had to be strong, this was no easy task. The amount of force alone to complete such a task would take a lot out of any person, no matter what their strength is. There is a slit along the stomach of the body, it looks like the unsub cut the body open, I keep a mental note that it could have been an urge to eat the human flesh, if it is then they usually go for the organs. I will have to ask the M.E about if there was any organs missing, the actions of cannibalism will be important to the profile if it is true. I examine each and every piece as I wait for the M.E to go get some more paper copies for me to take back to the station, it always makes things take a little longer but I can use this time to look a little closer at the bodies. The official report can answer a lot of questions for me but I tend to be a little more hands on when it comes to my work. Morgan looks focused as he takes his time on the other side of the room to look at everything, some people would find this eerie, the silence among the only two living people in the room as they stand if front of the dead, but this calms me. Not the fact that they are dead but the concentration on the work is what I enjoy, just completing the task at hand. Morgan looks up and goes to talk, breaking the silence.

"Izzy was pretty good today with Hank, she really seemed to be in her element with him" Morgan says to me. I don't know where he is going with this, I already told Izzy that I saw that motherly instinct in her come out, and it was nice to see.

"Yeah she was. I already told her that earlier" I say to him, I watch as my words make his expression change into a big smile. He is laughing. "What is so funny?" I ask him.

"No wonder you guys were a little late, she was probably getting baby fever and your comments indulged her" He continues to laugh as he speaks.

"That isn't true, and we didn't do anything that you are insinuating" I try and keep my voice calm, let him know that this conversation isn't making me as nervous as it truly is. Morgan would never let me live it down if he knew that me and my girlfriend of almost 6 months, someone I actually have met in person and spend each and every day with, have not had sex yet. It isn't something I tend to bring up into conversation, especially not with Morgan.

"Whatever you say kid, but I guarantee she will be looking at you with big heart eyes for the rest of the day" He says to me. I want to say something witty back at him, but even thinking about saying anything out loud about that possibility that I could be breaking Izzy's heart today just makes me too sad. I don't want to hurt her, I really don't, but I just can't give her that chance for her to meet my mom, at least not right now. My feelings and the M.E. walking back into the room that keep me from unloading everything I have been keeping inside.

"Here are your paper copies Doctor Reid, just let me know if you will need me to fax over anything else" She tells me. She gives me the files and I scan over them, reading at an incredible speed that astonishes many but has always come naturally to me. There have been times when Izzy had come over and we were just spending our day off enjoying each other's company, me sitting on the couch reading a book while she watches and smiles, planting small kisses along my hand she holds while I balance the book with my free one, only slightly distracting me. Just thinking about the two of us siting on my couch, snuggled up together, having that close contact that I used to hate but feels so right with her, makes everything weigh down heavier than already on my mind. I break out of my trance and give her a smile.

"Thank you" I tell her.

"What do we know about the victim?" Morgan asks her.

"He obviously was cut into pieces, the cause of death was the slitting of the throat causing him to bleed out, it would have been a quick death but filled with a lot of pain. My conclusions was that the cutting of the limbs was done post modem but the cut to the abdomen was done while our victim was still alive"

"So there was some torture involved?" Morgan asks.

"I would say yes" She replies.

"Was there any sign of missing organs?" I ask her.

"No, everything seemed to be there when I was examining him" She says and Morgan and I both breathe a sigh of relief, while we can't rule cannibalization out until we finish with the profile, this is giving a very good chance that we don't have a cannibal roaming the streets.

"What about the dismembering of the body, was there anything surgical about it?" Morgan asks.

"That was one thing that bothered me about that, there weren't the obvious signs that this was performed by anyone with medical knowledge, but there was the level of organization from someone that was precise but almost just ordinary enough to not to raise any flags"

"So our unsub either has done this before or is incredibility smart" Morgan says.

"Or both" I reply to him. All of the questions that have been floating around my head have started to get some answers.

 **Izzy's POV**

Prentiss drives as I read her the directions to the address Garcia sent us. It look her a little longer than usual to get us a direct address to where the call was made from but she finally found it, as we get closer and closer Garcia is trying to find everything she can on the therapists that work from that office, maybe find something that will give us the identity of who made that phone call. The car stops and I look up from the tablet I was reading from to see that we have pulled into the parking lot in front of a normal looking office building, who would have know a monster would have been brewing inside there for so long. We both get out of the car and she goes over to the sign out front that should have the list of all the names of the therapists that work there, I follow her and look, I notice that there is an empty slot among all the names. "It looks as if someone is leaving this office" I say to her.

"Or maybe they just want people to believe they are" She says back to me. I open up the door and hold it for Prentiss as she walks in, I soon follows behind her and we go inside to find many closed doors with names on them. "We should probably check the door without a name on it, if he covered his bases correctly then he would have taken the name off the door as well" She says.

"That makes sense" I reply as we look around the room. It is creepily quiet in the room, everything about the situation feels unsettling to me. Pretniss motions for me to come over to where she stands, she points to a door that has the fresh scar of what was once there, probably the name of the man we are looking for. Prentiss knocks on the door and we wait. We can hear a rustling coming from the inside, signs that there is someone in there. Suddenly a tall and lanky man opens the door and there are signs of relief in his eyes, that soon passes over and I can tell we are not the people he was expecting to see.

"Oh, hello. Are you two looking for a therapist? I usually treat the psychiatric but I could recommend you two to a wonderful couples therapist I know" He tells us, Prentiss and I look at each other and I can tell we are both trying not to break out into a smile as we look back at him, Spencer would find this funny when I tell him later.

"Actually we aren't a couple, we are from the FBI" She tells him. I study his face closely and watch as the calmness from seeing us is rapidly changing to one of anxiety and fear. I pull out my badge and show him, Prentiss does the same.

"I am SSA Santiago and this is SSA Pretniss" I say and motion to her.

"I should have known you would be coming" He breathes out. He runs his hands through his already messy hair and pushes the door open as he walks back into his office. When he moves the door back I can see the room is now filled with boxes, he really must be moving out of the office.

"Does that mean you were the one who called in the tip to the police? The one about a patient of yours?" Prentiss asks him.

"Yes" He answers as he paces back and forth around the room. "He just came in and was so anxious, I kept asking him if he had been taking his medication because the way he was talking was just pure insanity. I kept trying to calm him down but he kept talking about all the delusions he has had the whole time I have been working with him. He kept saying that he needed to hurt those who had wronged him, that he was going to get the revenge he deserved. He had spent so much time talking in detail about how he was going to cut people up, dismember these bodies and all the ways he was going to hurt them, it got to be too much sometimes" He keeps rambling on, it looks like this person really took a toll on his and his mind.

"What is the name of this person? We need to find out his identity" Prentiss asks him, he continues to pace as if he is reliving all the moments he spent with our unsub.

"Christian, his name is Christian Barns and he came to me a little over a month ago" He breaths out and then sits down on the couch.

"I'll text Garcia and see if we can find this guy" Prentiss says and pulls out her phone, I walk over by the couch and try and talk more with him.

"Why didn't you give out your name or his name to the 911 dispatcher?" I ask him. "Was he in the room with you when you called?" I ask him, he is looking as if each question I ask him tears him apart just a little bit more.

"I honestly was in such an intense situation, he just came in and was so angry and I just needed to report him to someone, he said he was going to go on some killing mission to take out anyone he believed needed to die, as if they had wronged him. That was always the root of his delusions, he never really knew that many people but he felt as if there were people that made him this way, wronged him in some way and that he needed to take care of them"

"So this was a ongoing delusion?" I ask.

"Yes, I diagnosed him with Delusional Disorder very early on due to him having frequent delusions and often had a hard time distinguishing reality from fantasy, we had only met once a week for the past month, I didn't know if he was going to remain my patient after I moved my office out here, sorry about the mess" He tells me as he motions to all the boxes. So he wasn't trying to run away and hide, he had just moved into this office, and now he probably won't be moving in at all. If a maniac knew where I lived and had told me in gruesome detail of ways he could kill people, I would probably move right away.

"It is okay, gosh I don't even know your name yet, what is it?" I ask him, trying to get more information about him without flat out asking, I can tell he is a fragile man.

"It is Dennis Green, I am sorry I didn't give my name when I contacted the police, he had just left and I was worried that me or my family was in danger. I really didn't want to have to get involved, but I did want someone to know" He says, it looks as if he is about to cry.

"It is okay, we can get you protection for you and your family and if you could give us your files on him it would help us out a lot to find him" I tell him in a comforting voice, trying to make him feel a little bit better about an impossible situation. He nods his head and then walks over to a filing cabinet and pulls out a thin file.

"This is all I have on him, he was a newer patient of mine, sorry that I don't have more to give you guys" He says in a apologetic tone, he clearly thinks that any of this is his fault, as if his work as a therapist wasn't successful.

"Thank you for this, this is better than nothing" I give him a small smile and hope that my small gesture brings him some peace. I hand him my card before speaking again. "Just call me if you need anything, especially if Christian tries to contact you again, if he does want to have another session just try and bring it into conversation about how long it would take him to get to your office, at that point you will need to act calm and let him think you don't know anything about our investigation into him. If you can lead him here just get out of the building as soon as possible and alert us if he just shows up, he is very dangerous and you could be a potential target of his" I tell him in a very serious tone, sometimes therapists can be calm and think they can handle the situation, and sometimes they crack, and Dr. Green is seeming to be the latter.

"Why would I be a target?" He sounds frightened as he speaks.

"Sometimes unsubs blame their problems on others, he may believe you were the answer to curing him and since he finally acted out his impulses that could mean he blames you for his actions. It in no way means that it is actually true, that is just how his brain is processing that he was the one who committed these horrible crimes"

"So he really killed someone?" He says with a chill, I can physically see it go through his body.

"Yes, a homeless man. Did he ever talk about a hatred for the homeless, I know you mentioned a lot of his delusions revolved around the ideas of getting revenge"

"I don't believe so, but he did tell me that when he was younger him and his mother were homeless for a few months after his father left them. A recurring one of his delusions was him seeing his father again and tearing him limb from limb for leaving their family" He says.

"What was the reason his father left?" I ask, the killing of the homeless man was obviously a form of trying to kill who he was, he wants to detach himself entirely from who he used to be. Being homeless left him helpless, he is finally taking control, ready to start anew.

"He cheated on the mother, his mistress got pregnant and he left his wife so he could marry again and support his new family, it was truly awful to hear about. It really seemed to effect him even in the present" So any sleazeball father and husband, or someone he views that way, could be a potential new target.

"Did anything major happen recently to trigger this unraveling?" I ask, hoping somewhere we can find the stresser.

"His father did recently die, he went to the funeral. We had spent a whole session on it preparing and he seemed very well adjusted, it clearly must not have gone very well because when he came to his next session he was spiraling" We found the trigger.

"Thank you, that was very helpful" I smile and then walk out of the room back over to Pretniss.

"Garcia is looking up information on our unsub now, seeing if she can find anyone that matches the mental history of his patient"

"He gave me his file and told me a little bit more about who he is as a person, apparently this all happened after he went to his absent fathers funeral" I tell her.

"Well there is the stresser"

"That is what I thought, and there was a period of his life when because of his father him and his mother were homeless, the killing of the homeless man could be symbolic"

"Then he could either continue to kill homeless men or start to go after people like his father"

"We need to get back to station right away, start building this profile" I tell her and we both rush back out to the car.

We walk into the station and find the rest of the team all together, I see Spencer and give him a big smile, already imaging his laugh as I tell him about the therapist that thought Emily and I were a couple. Spencer goes up to Hotch and pulls him aside to tell him something, he gives him a look and then Spencer grabs my hand and leads me over to an empty room, Spencer flips on the lights and I let out laugh. "Wow, sexy" I joke with him, he doesn't laugh.

"Iz, I got to tell you something" His tone is serious. I step closer to him and study his face. "I wanted to wait until the case was over but I couldn't let this weigh on me anymore, I have just felt so bad all day"

"Spencer, you are scaring me" Everything bad that a guy could ever do starts playing out in my mind, but none of it matches his personality, not my Spencer.

"Don't be scared, I just have to talk to you about something" I can feel my heart begin to beat regularly again, he isn't going to break my heart right here in this empty room in the middle of Las Vegas.

"Oh okay, you really were worrying me though" I tell him.

"I just wanted to let you know that I don't think it is a good idea for you to meet my mom" I can feel my heart drop, maybe he really is about to break my heart.

"What? Why?" I ask, I can feel my voice wavier, I have to stay strong, I refuse to cry in front of him right now.

"She just hasn't been very well lately, I don't think introducing new people to her right now is going to help her condition, it might just make her more confused about everything" He tells me, he sounds sad when he talks about his mom and her condition. He hasn't told me that she was getting worse, why would he keep something like this from me?

"Spencer, I'm not just anybody, I am your girlfriend" I say in a hushed yell, I don't want to make a scene right here, it wouldn't be professional.

"I know, and trust me there will be a time for you to meet her, just not right now" I can't imagine that this will be the last time he says something like this to me, he is always going to want to wait for a better time.

"Do you not think we are going anywhere? Is that it? Do you think that little of our relationship?" I ask him, I blink away the tears as I speak, I can't let him know how much this is hurting me.

"That isn't it at all" He protests.

"Were you just screwing with me earlier when you said something about me moving in? Was that to try and toy with me in some way?" I say in a raised tone.

"That was real, it still is. I meant it when I said it" He tells me, the hardest part is he sounds sincere.

"Then why don't you want me to meet your mom, what is the real reason? Are you embarrassed of me or something?" I can't help but let my mind go to my race, while I am only half Mexican I could easily pass for full, is he worried his mom won't be accepting of someone who isn't white?

"That isn't it at all, I already told you. I am worried that she won't react well to a new person, it could just confuse her and I don't want her to get worse"

"I know your mom has Alzheimer's, and it hurts me deeply to see you in pain about it but I would judge you or your mom, I can take whatever may come with her because I would give anything so that my mom could meet the man I love" I stop abruptly after I let the word 'love' fall off my lips.

"What?" He asks. He sounds more surprised than anything.

"Fuck" I mutter underneath my breath, he shouldn't have found out this way. I don't want him to not say it back, or worse tells me he loves me when I am so pissed off at him, I would rather things are just left unsaid. "We better get back out there" I say as I walk past him and open up the door, I feel him grab my arm.

"Izzy, wait" When I turn to him I finally let a tear fall, he wipes away the tear. I don't say anything but I pull my arm away. I wipe my face and make sure that no one will see me upset, I check my watch and see only a few minutes have passed, I try and look like we weren't fighting, we promised Hotch that the job would come first, then and now I intend to keep that promise.

"What did I miss" I say casually, ensuring that they don't think there is anything wrong.

"I was actually just telling them about how it went with the therapist, I know you talked to him more though so why don't you tell us what he said" Prentiss tries, she could have easily told them what we both know, she wanted me to have this.

"He told me that our unsub is named Christian Barns, he was being treated under Dr. Dennis Green for Delusional Disorder, he had an absent father that left his mother for another woman, he started a new family and left them homeless" I say.

"That must be why he killed a homeless man" Rossi says.

"That was what Izzy and I were thinking, we thought it was possibly that he projected himself in the homeless man and was trying everything he could to get rid of the old him" Prentiss tells the group.

"We think his next victim type is going to be one of similarity to his father, the therapist said that the stresser might be the death of his father, after going to the funeral he came back to the office having the delusions" I tell them.

"So now we can build a better profile" JJ says as she smiles at me. Morgan's phone begins to ring and he picks it up and puts it on speakerphone.

"Hey baby girl, what do you got for us?" Morgan asks her.

"A whole lot of nothing, I have searched that name over and over throughout my data base and couldn't find a match to that name, there was a few sure but none of them had ever been homeless, had a recent death of the father or even been treated by any psychiatrist before, I am so sorry guys, I don't know what I possibly could have done wrong" She sounds upset.

"Penelope calm down, we know this isn't your fault" Morgan reassures her.

"He could have used a fake name" Spencer says, it is the first thing he has said since our fight.

"So our unsub is smart" Hotch says.

"Everything about this guy doesn't sit right with me, he was smart enough to not only use a fake name but to also to be skilled and precise enough to cut up a body but suffers from serious delusions and is unraveling, nothing about this case makes sense" Morgan says.

"Sometimes they don't always make sense, but we need to deliver this profile, especially if our unsub is using a fake name, it will be even harder to find him now" Rossi says, we all nod our head in agreement and make our way out of the room and stand before everyone. We all line up and I see a dozen pair of eyes starting back at us.

"We are looking for a white male in his early 30's, he is patient and intelligent but is starting to unravel. He suffers from delusions and should be considered highly dangerous" Hotch starts out.

"He is strong, he had enough strength to properly dismember a body, meaning he could have medical training or the type of job where those skills would be needed such as a butcher" Morgan says.

"He has targeted a homeless man as his first victim, he chose that victim because we believe he was projecting himself into that man and wanted that part of him to die, this unsub has a lot of anger and self hatred" JJ says.

"That anger and self hatred comes from the abandonment of his father, he believes his father wronged him and he is now searching for justice and revenge any way he seems fit" Prentiss adds.

"He sought out help from a therapist but used a fake name, meaning he once had hope for treatment but now believes the only way is to kill" Rossi says.

"He is considered to be extremely dangerous so if you do find someone that matches the unsub approach with extreme caution" Hotch says.

"Search around areas with high population of homelessness and any shelters, those along with hotels could be targets" Spencer says.

"The hotels could be targets because of the chance of spouses cheating there, infidelity is what ruined his life and he doesn't plan on allowing the injustice of it to happen anymore" I finish off. Hotch asks if there any questions and then we all go back into the other room. Without a positive ID of who our unsub is we are back to square one, we are going to have to work hard to match an identity to this son of a bitch before he strikes again. I sit down when I can feel my phone beginning to buzz, it is an unknown number but the area code is of Las Vegas, I pick it up. "Hello?" I say.

"Detective Santiago?" I hear breathe across the other line, something about the voice is chilling.

"Yes?" I ask, still a little unsure of who I am talking to.

"This is Dennis Green, the therapist" He says.

"Yes, so sorry about that, is everything alright?" I ask, he doesn't sound alright.

"No, at least I don't think so. I've been hearing sounds coming from outside my window, it could just be my imagination but I am worried he may try and come back to the office. I haven't gone home because I didn't want to put my family in danger but I am worried now that he is waiting outside for me" He almost says in a whisper.

"Okay, I need you to remain calm, I will be heading over there right now along with another officer to patrol the area and then we will get you to a safe location along with your family. Do not worry, we will be there soon" I tell him and I can hear him gulp.

"Okay, just please hurry" And then he hangs up the phone. I put my phone back in my pocket and go to talk to Hotch, it is just my luck that Spencer and Morgan are standing over by him.

"Hotch, the therapist of the unsub just called me, he has been pretty shaken up by this and he doesn't feel safe at the office, I told him that me along with another officer would be over to take him and his family somewhere safe, I am going to head over there and then meet you back here later" I tell him.

"Okay, just be careful, and take someone with you" He tells me. I know it isn't a thing about trust or worrying about me, it is about always having a partner there so you aren't alone. Spencer told me about when he was kidnapped it was when he was alone, he never told me it was JJ that was with him before it happened, that the two of them split up. I only learned that from her after one of our girls nights, she told me how that was something she was lie awake at night and think about, it broke my heart, knowing that she felt that way before. She told me the worst part was that Spencer never blamed her once, she said through slurred speech that him blaming her would have made it easier, sometimes forgiveness can be harder than blame.

"I could go with her" Spencer offers. I give him a cold stare before I even speak.

"You don't have too, I'll take a patrol officer" I say and then walk up to an officer who works at this precinct with the last name Owens on his shirt, he smiles and tells me yes and we walk off together to his car. It is a quiet drive, it is nice not to have anything to talk about sometimes but it lets my brain work and think through the fight Spencer and I had earlier today, I can't get the look on his face when I said I loved him out of my mind. He didn't seem upset or even disgusted, but he didn't seem like he was jumping at the chance to return the phrase. When we get there officer Owens offers to go inside with me.

"Your supervisor was pretty clear that he wanted me to stick with you" He argues.

"I will be okay, I have built trust with him already. Why don't you keep an eye out for anything out here and I will just go in and bring him out, it will be quick and fast" I tell him, I can tell he is going to be cooperative.

"Alright, but if you aren't out in 10 minutes I am going to come in looking to make sure everything is alright"

"Thank you" I tell him. I walk inside the building I was just at this morning and walk into the room without a name on it, I twist the nob and open the door to find Dr. Green facing the window. "All ready to go?" I ask him. He slowly turns around and that is when I notice the gun in his hand, I take a step back and know that if I take one more I will be out of the room, and away from the danger I can sense.

"Why don't you close the door" He says in an unsettling voice. I can feel my heart begin to beat faster and my palms begin to sweat, I turn around and slowly close the door, every inch I move brings me closer and closer to being trapped in a room with what I now know is a killer.

 **Reid's POV**

I lay my head on the table and close my eyes slightly, first the fight with Izzy and now we have hit a wall, in terms of baseball I am one miss away from a strike out. I try and think of every possible combination of names that Christian Barns could stand for, the hardest part about this is the name could not even mean anything, it could be completely random. When I close my eyes all I can see is Izzy telling me she loves me, that was supposed to be a special moment for us and it was during a goddamn fight. I didn't know how to respond, I mean I love her, of course I love her, I just have never told anyone before that I love them. With Maeve I never got the chance and with Izzy I basically blew it. I open my eyes and sit up when I can hear everyone else come into the room. I pull out my phone and call Garcia, I look down at the list of names I have written down on my pad and know the only way to get to the bottom of this is by reading her every single one until we find some sort of correlation. She picks up on the second ring and I put her on speaker so everyone can hear. "Hello" She says in a dreary voice, she must still be taking this pretty hard, her inability to find the identity of this unsub is driving me crazy, I didn't even think to consider how this must be bothering her to no end.

"Hey Garica, I have been compiling a list of possible names that the unsub could have gotten Christian Barns from, just let me know when you are ready and I can start reading them out for you" I tell her.

"How many names do you have?" She asks me.

"So far 57" I say. She breathes out a giant sigh and I can feel her eyes rolling through the phone.

"Why don't you just give me the name of the therapist and I will tell you if anyone with the type of insurance his practice goes through has one of those names or if anyone at that particular office has had a patient by one of those names" She tells me.

"Okay, Izzy and Emily told me it was Dennis Green" I tell her and wait, I can hear her tapping on her keyboard but there is a pause.

"Oh no" She says.

"What is it Garcia?" Prentiss tells her.

"Are you absolutely positive that the therapist that called 911 and that told you all the information about our unsub is named Dennis Green?" There is urgency and worry in her voice.

"Yes, baby girl what is going on?" Morgan asks her.

"Dennis Green is, well was, a practicing therapist at that same office where I traced the call too-" I cut her off, the use of the past tense when talking about the therapist isn't sitting well with me.

"What do you mean was?" I ask for clarification.

"I mean was as he was fired a little over a month ago from that very office. He was fired after an altercation with one of his patients, he was sent to a psych ward after that when he was diagnosed with Dissociative identity disorder and delusions. After that things really seemed to go down hill for him, he not only lost his job but his wife filed for divorce about a week ago and recently put their house on the market, it looked like she was leaving him" The delusions, the leaving of a spouse in a marriage, a broken family, all similar narratives as the unsub.

"He is the unsub" Hotch says. Everything makes sense now, the clarity among the chaos, it was two different personalities this whole time.

"Oh my god, Izzy" I say. I can feel the panic begin to over take me, she went to go bring him back here. She is among a killer, and I lead her to him. I get up and run, not even bothering to pick up my phone with me, I can hear the footsteps of my team behind me, I only stop to put on a bullet proof vest, something I know realize she must not have. We all pile into the cars and I try and breathe, even though I know that something terrible could already have happened. We pull up to find one of the police cars already outside, the officer she left with sits inside, unknowing to what is happening. The air is filled with the sound of police sires and then a single gunshot, followed by my screams.

 **Izzy's POV**

I stand very still as he raises the gun and now points it at me, I should have known he was the unsub all along, he had us all fooled. "Hello Detective Santiago" He says in a deeper voice than before, there is something different about him.

"Dr. Green, why don't we all just calm down okay? We can sit down and talk" I offer, I try and remain as calm as I can, letting him know I am scared is just what he wants.

"Talking doesn't work, and stop calling me Dr. Green, are you trying to taunt me!" He screams, he isn't Dr. Green anymore, Dissociative identity disorder, that explains the differences in the victim, it wasn't just one person there.

"Okay, I am sorry. Can I know your name? Mine is Izzy" I try, trying to connect with him might make him more rational, there has to be something I can do that can trigger Dennis' personality to come out.

"Haven't you already heard, It's Christian, the doctor has been blabbing it to anyone that will listen" He spits out. He somehow knows about our investigation, maybe he saw something on television when we were trying to find the therapist.

"I bet that made you angry" I say in clean clear voice, I try and keep my face the same and not flinch even though I can see him get a tighter grip on his gun.

"Of course it made me angry, if he had just helped me in the first place no one would die, even though there are plenty of people who deserve it. Take the good doctor for example, he is divorcing his wife and moving away, he was not only going to leave behind his son but me too" I can see him getting emotional when talking about that. The delusion he invented about the abandonment is coming back to haunt him.

"Like your father abandoned you?" I try, it is daring but it might help me get out of this alive. If I can only distract him for long enough I can reach for my own gun that he hasn't managed to notice yet.

"Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! You don't know a damn thing about my father"

"I know he left you, and I am so sorry about that" I apologize to him, let him know I can sympathize with him. I can hear the sounds of sirens, at first faint but soon they grow, my team is coming for me. If only I can distract him a little longer.

"You hear that?" He asks me.

"Hear what?" I play dumb, pretend not to hear the sound of rescue coming our way.

"Times up. See, talking never manages to get you anywhere" I have nothing to loose now, as long as I can get him to not aim for my head I can survive, I reach for my own gun on my right hip, he must think the best way to stop me is by shooting at that spot because I am knocked down by the force of an intense pain in my lower stomach. It is quick and I move my hand to put pressure on the bleeding, this isn't the first time I have been shot but never in such a risky place as my stomach, a lot could go wrong. I watch him run out the room, I can hear the sounds of screams as I hold my hand up, already soaked in blood. I don't know if they are my own or not, I can feel my head begin to spin, along with the room. I hear the sound of two more gun shots, he wasn't getting out of here alive, we both knew it. I crane my neck to look over and watch as his eyes roll back, I can only hope he got to die as Dennis. I hear heavy footsteps come near me, then I see the big brown eyes of my Spencer. He gets down on the ground and is already crying, he plants small kisses on my cheeks and I can feel the pressure of his hands over mine that cover my wound.

"Oh baby, baby I need you to stay with me" He tells me. He only ever calls me baby when we are alone, he isn't really into the couple nicknames but this one he likes, I never told him before how it sends chills down my spine when he calls me that. Maybe he will never know.

"Spencer" I can manage to say. The sound of his name coming out of my lips makes him smile and cry harder simultaneously.

"I love you, I love you so much and everything is going to be okay, you are going to be okay" Everything is happening so fast, I want to tell him I love him too but I can feel myself slipping, fading. I see the faces of my entire team as I am lifted onto a stretcher, Spencer's hand never leaves mine and his eyes are the last thing before I allow myself to fall into darkness.

 **Reid's POV**

I can't even sit, I am too nervous about Izzy being in surgery. Surgery to remove the bullet, she was shot. I still can't wrap my head around all of this, I keep thinking about our fight, that stupid fight that doesn't even matter anymore. Everyone else sits, I can't help but think back to the last time we were all in the hospital waiting for one of our own to get out of surgery, that was the day we all thought we had lost Emily. And yet here she is, sitting next to JJ as we all wait anxiously for any news about Izzy, my Izzy. "Spence, why don't you sit down?" JJ says in a quiet voice, she talks to me like she talks to her child when they are upset about something.

"I don't think I can sit" I choke out. I haven't talked much in the past two hours mostly just crying. Running in there and seeing her like that was all too familiar with Maeve, a bullet took her away from me and I'm not going to let a bullet take away Izzy from me as well. JJ just nods her head at my response and I see a doctor walking towards us.

"Are you guys the family of Isabella Santiago?" He asks.

"We are her team, we are apart of the Behavioral Analysis Unit with the FBI" Hotch answers.

"And I am her boyfriend" I add.

"How is she?" Emily asks him.

"She is in recovery now, the surgery went very well and she is expected to make a full recovery. The bullet didn't hit any major organs or bone, it just grazed tissue mostly and it was easy to extract the bullet. She should be waking up soon but I am going to ask that there are only a few visitors for right now, we don't want to overwhelm her" He says.

"Thank you" I tell him and actually feel like giving him a hug, letting him know how grateful I am that he was able to save her. He gives us a smile and then walks away, over to another family to give them an update on their loved one.

"Spencer, why don't you go in there and be with her, we will be waiting out here for you, we can visit later" Emily tells me as she wipes away a tear and smiles.

"We can go out and bring you guys something back to eat" Rossi offers. I nod my head and let them all pull me in for another hug, it is when I hug Morgan that I begin to cry, remembering how Savannah was shot while pregnant with their son, he could have lost both of them that day.

"She is alright kid" Morgan tells me, I nod my head and then make my way over to her room. I open the door and see her laying on the bed, she has an IV hooked up to her arm and I can't help but notice how small she looks laying in that bed, so fragile, the total opposite of her personality. I pull a chair up next to her bed and sit down in it, I take her hand in mine and plant small kisses along her fingers. Her hands look so pale, as if that is even possible. I can see her eyes begin to flutter awake and she looks over and smiles at me.

"You called me baby" She mumbles and then begins to laugh.

"What?" I ask her, breaking out into a smile myself as the tears fall.

"You called me baby, you never call me baby unless we are alone" She says as she tries to sit up, she winces from pain and realizes she won't have such an easy time as she though she would.

"It didn't matter, I was so worried about you" She fully opens her eyes now and is really looking at me, she takes her free hand and wipes away the tears from my face, much like I did earlier to her, only this time she isn't devastating me in the same way I know I devastated her.

"Please don't cry, I don't ever want you to be sad" She tells me. I don't know if it is the drugs that are making her this way but she doesn't at all seem worried about herself, she got shot and she is telling me she never wants me to be sad, what have I done to deserve her? I ask myself.

"I'm sorry, I am so sorry for earlier okay?" I tell her, I refrain myself from telling her about just how many times I thought about how I might have never gotten the opportunity to let her know that.

"It's okay, I am not angry anymore because I love you" She has the biggest smile on her face as she tells me this.

"I love you too" I tell her.

"I know, I've always known" She tells me and it brings me some peace to know that she knows, from now on I am going to do everything I can to make sure she knows every single day because I don't intend on letting her go.

 **Izzy's POV**

It's been three days and I am finally out of the hospital, the stitches itch and I am the most uncomfortable I think I have ever been but I would never let Spencer know that, he has been trying so hard to make everything perfect and it isn't like he can do anything about it. Even though the entire team protested about going home without me I told them there was nothing they could do by staying in Vegas, they reluctantly went home leaving me with strict instruction to not come back to work for a week, even giving Spencer a few days off to get me safely home and an extra day to spend with me. The heat is think and it brings even more discomfort for me, I reach to turn up the AC in the car when I feel the sharp pains again. "If you need anything all you have to do is ask" Spencer says and he reaches the knob with ease and turns up the air for me.

"I know, I'm just not used to having everything done for me" I say.

"Well get used to it because I will be there to do anything you need while you heal" He tells me.

"It isn't even that big of a deal" I say, it really isn't. So I have a couple of stitches, that doesn't mean I am not capable of doing some stuff for myself.

"Not that big of a deal? You got shot" He protests.

"Okay, so maybe a minor deal at most" I joke.

"You are awfully stubborn" He says. I look out the window, we have been driving for a lot longer than I thought we would to be getting to the airport.

"Spence?"

"Yes?"

"Are we almost to the airport?" I ask him.

"Actually I felt really bad about never showing you around anywhere while in Vegas so I thought I would take you somewhere special before we have to go home, if that is okay with you?" He says in a excited tone, wherever we are going must be good and he must think that just shot and all I can handle it.

"Okay" I tell him. We drive a little longer and then we pull into a parking lot of a big building, Spencer parks the car and then gets out and goes over to my side to help me out. He keeps his arm around me as we walk up the little bit of steps, he leads me to a front desk and everyone is smiling at him as if they know him. When we get to the front desk he smiles at the woman as if they are old friend.

"Spencer, how lovely it is to see you again. I'll let Dianna know that you and your beautiful friend are here to see her" Dianna, his mom's name. He actually took me to come meet his mom.

"She is actually my girlfriend" He tells her proudly.

"Well this must be an extra special visit then" She smiles at us and leads us to a big opened room with couches and games on tables, a T.V. in the corner and many people around. In the middle of the room sitting on one of the couches is a woman with short blonde hair, she looks nervous and then she notices Spencer and her whole face just lights up. She stands up and looks like she wants to run at him and envelope him in a big hug but she stands and waits for us to come over to her. When we are closer Spencer lets go of me to hug his mom, I can't remember seeing him happier than he looks in this very moment.

"Oh Spencer, how good it is to see you" She gives him a big smile.

"Hi mom" He says. When he pulls away he puts his arm around me again. "Mom, I have brought someone very special here to meet you" He tells her. She seems hesitant at first but when I reach out my hand she shakes it.

"Hi, I'm Izzy. It is so nice to meet you" She looks at Spencer for a sign that it's safe to keep talking.

"This is my girlfriend mom, the one I have told you about" He tells her. It takes her a moment but then he memory is jogged and I watch as pieces start to fit together.

"That's right, Spencer has told me about you. It is really nice to meet you. Please, both of you sit" She says and then sits in the couch opposite from us, Spencer helps me sit down and then sits down himself. "So what do you do for a living?" She asks me.

"Mom, don't you remember, Izzy works at the BAU with me"

"That's right, you are a profiler as well"

"Yes" I answer.

"It can be dangerous work, but Spencer loves it so much and that team greatly benefits from that beautiful mind of his" She tells me, I let out a laugh.

"Yes, he is brilliant" I tell her. She smiles and we begin a conversation about a mutual topic that we can both relate too, Spencer.

"All that genius and to think when he was a little boy he wanted to be a tightrope walker for the circus"

"I did?" He questions.

"Yes, you did. I took you to this circus when you were just a little boy and you were so amazed, you actually tried to balance yourself on our fence, trying so hard to get across. You had all the mathematics planned out perfectly but you were just so small that you fell, there was so much blood, how do you think you got that scar on your wrist" She tells him. I take his hand in mine and check his wrist to find that small scar she remembered.

"But I thought I wanted to be a magician when I was little?"

"You did, but this was before. I still remember your excitement when you glued that little picture of your head onto a newspaper clipping from an article about the circus. My little boy with such big dreams" She reminisces with us. We talk and talk among the three of us for what seems like hours, Spencer stands up and lets us know that he is going to go get some water, leaving me and the mother of the man I love to finally be alone.

"You have a truly amazing son, he is so kind" I tell her.

"Thank you, will you promise me something?" She asks kind of suddenly, I begin to worry this might be a promise I won't be able to keep.

"Anything" I tell her instead because I can tell from the look in her eyes that this is very important.

"Promise me that you will take care of him for me" She asks me, it seems like a lot to ask but I don't even hesitate before giving my response.

"Always" I tell her, knowing this is a promise I can keep. Spencer comes back and we say our goodbyes, even earning a hug from Dianna before walking out. Spencer holds me close and I whisper to him. "Thank you" Truly meaning it.

The plane ride home seems to be short, they flew out the jet for us so I could have a more comfortable ride back and I was very thankful for it, Spencer laid me down on the couch and wrapped me in a blanket so I could sleep, keeping watch on me the entire time home. When we got off the plane my car was there waiting for us, Spencer begins to drive when he turns to me quickly to ask a question. "Do you want to sleep over at my apartment?" He asks me, I can see the blush already creeping up his cheeks.

"Yes, but don't plan on getting lucky I joke, maybe if I hadn't just got shot" I semi joke with him. There is nothing more I would want right now than to jump his bones but that will have to wait for another time, and that is something I am okay with. He parks my car and then we walk up to his apartment, he sets both of our bags down and then leads me to the bedroom, I have been in his apartment before but something feels different this time, so much anticipation. "Spencer"

"Yes"

"Will you help me get my pajamas on?" I ask him. He nods his head in response and I can tell he is nervous, I am a little too. I stand there and take off my shirt, I stand in front of him with just a bra on, I've never been embarrassed of my body but I suddenly feel self conscious.

"Wow" He breathes out, from my experience with one other guy in my whole life that does seem like a good sign. "You are incredibly beautiful" He tells me. He gets closer to me and I kiss him quickly and then pull away as he helps me take my pants off, leaving me standing in front of him with only a bra and underwear. I begin laughing uncontrollably. "What?" He asks.

"You are finally seeing me undress but it is so you can help me put my pajamas on" I am laughing so hard I can feel tears spilling out of my eyes. "Nothing kills the mood faster than a bullet wound" I joke as I lift my legs into the pajama shorts he holds out for me. He hands me a tank top from my bag and I turn around as I take off my bra and quickly pull the tank top over my head, it hurts like hell but I bite my lip to stop from yelping out in pain. I turn around to face him and kiss him quickly again. "Soon" I breathe out. "Once I am healed" I let him know.

"I know" He tells me as I take his hand and lead him over to his bed. I pull back the covers and lay down, he lays behind me with his arms wrapped around my middle. He kisses my shoulders and whispers to me. "I love you" he says over and over, this might just be the most intimate moment I have ever shared with anyone. As I feel his arms wrapped around me I know anywhere with him is home because he is my home.

 **Authors note-Hey guys! First I want to apologize for the lack of posting, it is for a very good and exciting reason though. So all my life I have always wanted to be an author and I actually came to this website as a way to publish my work and a few months ago I got in contact with a publisher about potentially having one of my books published. It was such an amazing moment and I have been working very hard to write my book, I really hope you guys can understand. Fanficion is very much a priority but this is such an amazing opportunity that I have been working so hard to prefect it, and along with that my uncle who has basically been a father to me was in the hospital for a little while, it was very scary and obviously I dropped everything to be with him, but everything is thankfully good now. I have been keeping up with Criminal Minds and spoilers for those who don't know about Reid's major story line this season but it was intense af and even though it put me through hell for weeks to see my baby be in prison it was all worth it to see him find some happiness at the end of the season. Also getting to fully watch it play through really helped me plan for the future and how I might potentially address that situation in my fanfiction, so you guys will have that to look forward too. Again I want to apologize but I hope my super long chapter that I stayed up very late on a school night to finish for you all can help a little bit. If you liked the chapter reviews are appreciated and I love you all and when I promise you there will be a new chapter soon I actually mean it. When I get out of school I will be sticking to a more formatted schedule for when I am going to update so look out for that in my bio by the end of June, I am already predicting every Wednesday, in honor of Criminal Minds night, that a new chapter will go out. I love you all and until next time-Izzy**


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